Bienvenidishes

Artist: Alexkid
Album: Bienvenida
Released in: 2001
Provenance: Probably England

Alexkid uses electronica production techniques but mostly non-electronic instrumentation, creating jazz- and Latin-influenced tracks that groove like house but sound like they are being played by session musicians (and they were, I think). He's clearly a skilled producer, but I bought this CD because of the title track and it remains the only stand-out. The rest of the CD is pleasant but sort of blah, with one semi-disastrous trip into the 90's featuring the doyenne of downtempo spoken word nonsense, Ursula Rucker.

I once saw Alexkid DJ in London, and he seemed unusually grouchy. Perhaps more people than just me were not fans of his debut. However, I did acquire a second Alexkid album at some point, though its current location is unknown. I'm sure it will appear here eventually...

Dishes Safari

Artist: Air
Albums: Moon Safari and Premiers Symptomes (EP)
Released in: 1998 and 1999
Provenance: ?

Kudos to Air. Ten years after Moon Safari and Premiers Symptomes were originally released, they still go down super smooth. It's not ideal dish-washing music (too low energy), but Air have successfully avoided the datedness that marks a lot of late-90's and early-00's downtempo.

Best moment: Le Soleil est Pres de Moi from Premiers Symptomes. Perfectly captures the spacey feeling when I go off my allergy medication... but in a good way.

Worst moment: Sexy Boy from Moon Safari. This was the first Air song I heard, and it took a while before someone could convince me to buy Moon Safari anyway. Yes, everyone loves it, but something about the breathy vocals, the synths that sound like a monkey is pounding on the keyboard, something makes me irritated.

The Airfest continues in the next post.