Remember Remember - Forgetting the Present

Remember Remember
Forgetting the Present
30 June 2014
Rock Action

3 stars out of 5

 

Forgetting the Present is the third LP by Glaswegian instrumental band Remember Remember. Of course, when one thinks “Glasgow” and “instrumental band,” one usually thinks of Mogwai, so it’s of minimal surprise that the double-R crew is signed to that Scottish post-rock institution’s Rock Action label. However, beyond the superficial and rather trivial intersections of geography and (presumably) friend circles, Remember Remember have little in common musically with their elder patrons.

Forgetting the Present opens with “Blabbermouth,” which is situated in the blissful chill-out tent somewhere between Tangerine Dream and Michael Brook. It sets the tone for the album: New Age-y keyboard bits and bytes, functional drum and bass parts, fairly pedestrian rhythms and time signatures. This is a band that takes very few risks. Once the listener makes it to track four, “The Old Ways,” it’s apparent that everything is going to sound the same: the keyboard melodies are derivative of each other, and with no character injected into the music apart beyond that, Forgetting the Present quickly becomes tiresome listening. I suppose if you were stoned out of your tree this sort of thing might seem deep or revelatory, but who cares what a stoner thinks about anything? Seriously.

But then “Pterodactyl” comes along, with its quirky Stereolab-ish groove, and things seem to be looking up. Could it provide the creative momentum to save the record from drifting listlessly in the doldrums? Alas, no. The band was just teasing us. For the remaining three tracks they fall back into predictable New Age clichés, the sort that could provide the score to a documentary on the Oort cloud or the incredible and fascinating world of evaporation (to be perfectly honest, I would totally watch both of those). All told, this is a disappointing record. “Pterodactyl” is worth the listen, but beyond that, there’s nothing here that demands your close attention.

reviewed by Richard Krueger