A Jean Giraud

A Jean Giraud

Professor Genius [This Is Not An Ex...

22 May, 2008 | 11.52AM

• Written by: Mark Treadwell
• Filed under: Music Recommendations: brennan green, exit, giraud, professor genius

Its here just in time for those warm hazy summer days!

Along with the girls that were hot wearing less than bikinis, and the rockers and lovers driving Lamborghinis, the ambient revival is in full swing.

Well, “swing” may be a little too upbeat, but you know what I am getting at.

Just in at the right moment then, New Jersey’s Professor Genius has created an ambient opus full of out of sync blips and beeps drenched in swathes of synth. 

What is meant to be composed as a dedication to Giraud becomes as much a homage to the analogue synthesiser, as to the man himself.

The three tracks entitled Giraud 1, 2 and 3 although presented as three separate entities, seem to have been constructed to be listened to as one extended instrumental, only defined by the final thirds’ lack of any sort of beat or bass line. 

Brennan Green, label head of Chinatown Records and one of the most prolific producers around, is on remix duties turning Giraud One into skitter beat, bongo-laden Balearic workout. 

Green triples the length and as beautiful and fragile as the original is, it is the mix that undoubtedly is the highlight.

Neither bastardising the original nor becoming dull and formulaic, it rides an effortless groove that can’t fail to get your sunglasses-adorned head a nodding.

Although some may dismiss this as café or coffee table music, as much at home in a middle-class household as it would be as a background soundtrack in one of any multinational coffee houses, to label it as such would be to dismiss it as something temporary and throwaway.

However this isn’t world music, nor is it the Womad festival, but rather a cosmic orchestral manoeuvre not in the dark, but one designed to be played under the scorching eye of the summer sun.

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