The Notwist - Neon Golden (Domino, 2002)

The Notwist
Neon Golden
Domino
2002

Rating: 10 hairy pits out of 10
 
I know it’s early yet to be making such claims, and I’ll probably change my mind a half dozen times, but this could be the album of the year.  It is most certainly my favorite album to come out so far, and I would be highly surprised if it wasn’t at least in my top five at year’s end.  The Notwist come from Germany, and have been around for a while, having released two or three albums on the Zero Hour label (that has since shut down), and maybe a couple more or so before that.  Early in their career, they started out as a metal/punk/hardcore band of some kind, but as time progressed, so did they.  in the mid-nineties, they added Martin Gretschmann to the band, who is known to some as Console, his electronic-music-noodling alter ego.  With his addition came a new sound, one that relied more on computer-generated sounds that would mesh with the organic sounds they were already producing. 

With Neon Golden, we have their first album of the new millenium, and a sound that fits.  Their sound could be best described as a combination of the following:  beats and noises that would fit in with the IDM set of Autechre and Squarepusher; music that consists of a wide variety of instruments at times, from banjos to strings to acoustic guitar, at times having the feeling of something that might have come from Red House Painters or someone similar; and the vocals, if they remind me of anything, remind me of Trembling Blue Stars or something along those lines.  But The Notwist are most definitely much bigger and better than the sum of their parts, and really don’t sound like anything else; and I would almost bet money that it will only be a matter of time before there are a lot of people who sound like them.  Track highlights include ‘pilot’, ‘this room’, and my favorite ‘one with the freaks’.  I honestly don’t think there is a weak track on the album though.  If you are at all interested in this type of music, hunt yourself out a copy of this album, and you too will be singing it’s praises to anyone who will listen.