Norman Records reviews regen:tropfen… gives 5 stars!
The first time I heard this I thought it was ace. I rarely get that these days. My attention span is so short that by the time an album is half way through I forget what I’m listening to. Maybe that’s an age thing though? I’m gonna call her Zazie for the rest of the review as her name is a bit of a gobful and it’s gonna save my fingers a bit of typing. This is Zazie’s debut and it was recorded in Berlin in a small little room with a garden view and in Nils Frahm’s studio (I presume with the help on Nils). Instruments on the album are piano, voice, cello, glockenspiel, field recordings, found sounds and also silence as an equivalent form of sound though it’s essentially piano based. It’s an astonishing debut as well. The music here is really powerful and emotive and whilst it’s doing all of that heavy stuff it’s also completely beautiful and absorbing! There’s loads of weird little noises and sounds that punctuate the music. Sometimes you’ll get the sounds of doors opening or random bits of German speech just firing through one speaker. Also silence plays a heavy part in the creation of the music with it cropping up in certain pieces adding a little of the less is more approach. Zazie’s sporadic vocals are delicate and fragile and they remind me of the pixie elf woman from Mum. If you’re into Yann Tiersen. Max Richter and Hauschka then this album has elements of all of those guys in and you should more than likely take note of this amazing album!
