Dirty Projectors’ Dave Longstreth is a talented guitar player, but not a particularly fashionable one. When his enthusiastic noodling overshoots the bowl by a couple of yards, it’s as though he secretly wishes he was born 40 years earlier so he could’ve had a shot at playing in Yes.
Even at their goofiest, though, DP are a remarkable band. Their inventive use of female vocals—harmonising, offsetting, arpeggiating—keep Longstreth’s ideas within due bounds.
This use of vocals as a wily contextual device is probably what roused Björk’s curiosity in the band. The two acts collaborated in early 2009, with the performance of a piece written by Longstreth for 5 voices and guitar.
MWO was written quickly, and the 2010 recording sounds as though it was performed mostly live—the vocalists seem to be singing directly to one another. If you close your eyes, it’s not difficult to imagine yourself sitting on the floor of the studio wallowing in the magic as it happens.
The set of songs is concise, encompassing upbeat love-struck pop, moody medleys and bizarre harmonic inversions. It’s nowhere near as dense as Bitte Orca or Volta, but it’s also not as simple as it first seems, rewarding multiple listens generously.
It’s best not to scrutinise too closely, as, out of necessity, the recording is charmingly off the cuff. But when the results are as simply beautiful as ‘No Embrace’, or as stunning as the vital, tender climax of ‘All We Are’, who cares how paired down or informal it feels? It’s beautiful music played by gifted musicians.
published 12/07/10 in The Brag
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