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13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Chunking, gritty house with a catchy edge, 15 Sep 2003
When I thought of Gus Gus, for some reason I always associated them with the Sasha & Digweed sound of old. The more epic Northern Exposure end of the scale. For this reason, I wrongly shunted them to the back of the pile of 'artists to check', and once again I find myself rueing the decision to not check them out before making my oh so worthy musical judgement. Someone I know had been repeatedly banging on about how wonderful this album and, in particular, the track David was. 'I still have last night in my body....' was repeatedly quoted at me. A few months later, I found myself shuffling through the dance section in HMV, happily picking up bits of Plaid, Global Underground, ra ra ra ... when I stumbled upon Attention. So I thought 'why not, give it a go'. And bloody glad I was too. What I was expecting was the more anthemetic breaksy prog trance of Purple from Northern Exposure 2 (no bad thing though, fine track too). What in fact came out of the speakers was the house sound I was right into at the time. Gritty, dirty beats. No messing house. But what makes the entire album so special is these good solid house foundations are married to wonderful catchy melodies, beautiful vocals! So good that Gus Gus should be the dance act running through the top 10, not some Ultrabeat or XTM guff. Whack the album on, you get a stripped down funky house intro of Unnecessary. From there we move to the 'pop' track of Attention. David is something that should have hit big, should have been heard everywhere, all the elements are right, grooving beats, catchy riffs and vocal. Great. Well at least it penetrated the underground I suppose (Darren Emerson's Underwater label has had a knack of pairing Gus Gus releases with nice remixes!). Desire comes next, almost an old skool Orbital track by sound. Wonderful synths, and etherial vocals echo around the electro breaks. Attention, Dance You Down and IIE let the house beats take the fore. Going from slow deep mechanical whirrings and repetative shout of ATTENTION on ... Attention, to the banging distorted hardcore bass drum and swirling acid synth of IIE. Call Of The Wild is the standout track of the album for me. Well programmed synths, changing attack and velocity as the track progresses, military style drumming, soothing soulful vocals. You have to hear it basically. Detention is a short little interlude of ambient synths, lovely in its own right. Your Moves Are Mine sets a soft vocal to dischordant beats and bass. The album rounds off with Don't Hide What You Feel, shuffling, staggering house beats eventually lead way to smooth vocals. Gus Gus count Massive Attack, Bjork and Madonna as fans. Perhaps Gus Gus should have been on production duties instead of Mirwais for American Life, because if you're going to do a gritty electronic house album, you do it like this. Proper Bo.
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~ Gus Gus
~ Gus Gus
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~ Múm
~ Gus Gus
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