The Orange Billboard by outlet Moonbabies NEUF

Tracks:
Fieldtrip USA
Sun A.M.
Over My Head
Crime o the Moon
Jets
Summer Kids Go
Forever Changes Everything Now
Slowmono
Wyomi
Orange Billboard, The
You Know How It Is

Performer Notes:

• Moonbabies: Carina Johansson, Ola Frick.
• Recorded at Sweet Morning Themesongs, Malmo, Sweden between 2002 & 2003.
• Personnel: Boogie Men (strings); Markus Weitner (bass guitar); Conny St„de (drums, shaker, percussion); Tomas Erlandsson (drums).
• Audio Mixers: Ola Frick; Carina Johansson.
• Recording information: Sweet Morning Themesongs Studio, Malmo, Sweden (2002-2003).
• Photographers: Markus Weitner; Jonas Quesel; Mark Mokszycki; Staffan Wieslander; Mark Olson .
• Unknown Contributor Role: Boogie Men.
• Will the indie pop melody well ever run dry? Maybe, but in the meantime Moonbabies have busted the pipeline, and its overflowing in their basement. Harmony, warm melody, and clever studio trickery color every inch of The Orange Billboard, Ola Frick and Carina Johanssons second full-length; its songs seem stung by a pinpoint of heat and filtered through a long prism, their elementary pop structure and crackling electronica jumbled into a dizzy rainbow of bewildering detachment. Are these people from Sweden or some kind of super-hip Candy Land? The verses of "Fieldtrip USA" run on a gentle acoustic guitar figure and what sounds like a sound effect from the Windows operating system; the image blisters, snaps, and blurs before downshifting Notwist-like into a pulsating indie rock bass groove. "Sun A.M." is even better, a blissfully perfect synthesis of sun-kissed twee and mouse-click bedroom electronica. "I become you," Frick sings in his cracked, plaintive falsetto. "Just wait and see us/Nine years from here/And I follow you." And whats senseless in print is butterflies-inducing genius in the studio. "Crime o the Moon" bounces along on a jaunty organ and xylophone chimes, inserting snippets of strings in a 21st century rebroadcast of Beatles psychedelia, while the instrumental "Jet" is a whirring and buzzing IDM cute-bot. (Just for kicks, Moonbabies detonate an airburst of electric guitar squelch over the center of the songs music-box-in-reverse sweetness.) Digital burbles and hisses slowly overtake the lush harmonies and layered acoustics of "Forever Changes Everything Now," suggesting the subtle remixing of Kings of Conveniences Versus album, and the title track cinches Orange Billboards fluttery loose ends of hushed harmony and polite pop to a kitchen sink outro of random noise bursts and announcements. By its end, Moonbabies sophomore outing has caused a slight body ache, the sweaty but not altogether unpleasant feeling of napping under too many blankets. Indie pop has relied happily on the hugnkiss of melody and charm for plenty a year, and the formula has yet to fail. Still, its heartening to find some curious souls willing to plug that sweet sentiment into greater stylistic wanderlust and groovy electronic adventurism. ~ Johnny Loftus

Producer: Ola Frick, Carina Johansson

Format: CD (1 Disc); Stereo

Country: USA

Studio/Live: Studio

Release Date: 13 January, 2004

Label: Hidden Agenda Records

Dimensions: 12.8 x 14.6 x 1 centimeters (0.06 kg)