Insanely catchy, densely layered and nothing but beautiful, this, Luke Temple’s first record under the Here We Go Magic name, has just become our favorite Saturday morning LP for 2009.
Wrapping acoustic guitars and shimmering vocal lines into the textures of retro synthesizers and poly-phonic beats, this record hits all the right Gang Gang Black Beach Bear Collective contemporary experimental reference points as well as touching on perpetual left of center obsessions like Can, Eno or the The Ethiopiqués series. But, unlike a lot of similar paced and themed records of late, here the haze of drone and reverb pulls back to reveal well-crafted and classic songs befitting a much less-cynical time. It’s totally unique, experimental and artsy, but it’s also timeless and elegant, and, Amazingly, what the melodies and vocals evoke most is the entire Paul Simon songbook turned inverted art dream.

There’s certainly something otherworldly and alchemical in the sound of Here We Go Magic. The scope of the writing is so broad and the instrumentation so varied and mysterious that it’s impossible to really figure out how it’s being done. Tape compression has warmed the sound pulling everything into a tightly packed mass with only flickers of strumming allowed to escape.

The first four songs all open to one another expanding and growing the concept until finally landing on central track ‘Tunnel Vision‘. It’s the kind of track that stays with you for days and when it finishes it’s a relief to escape into relative simplicity of ‘Ghost List‘, an ambient tumbling of loops that builds into a storm. It’s then that the far reaches of this record begin to be touched developing evermore Eno-like, scenic, ‘weird’ and wired until final track ‘Everything’s Big‘ leaves you feeling ‘everything’s going to be all right’ with a come down and say goodnight worthy of Nina Simone or ‘On The Beach‘ era Neil Young.

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