Reviews
Jatun
Jatun
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Add to del.ico.us.Review Date: 2007-03-11
Have you ever seen the Russell Crowe film A Beautiful Mind? Hard work, isn’t it? It’s one of those films where you have to want to watch it to enjoy it, otherwise it is really heavy going. Jatun’s self-titled album is very similar. It’s very difficult to listen to and enjoy if you are fully concentrating on it, but as background music works perfectly. Now, I think I’ve summed up the album, the review is over. Well, actually I don’t think I’d be allowed do that by Dan, so I suppose I’ll have to trundle on. Maybe talk about the songs a bit.
It’s difficult to differentiate the songs from each other, and nothing here a specific sound. You wouldn’t walk into a frat house (I say frat house, because being high would help you appreciate the ‘colours’ of the music a lot more) and immediately say “oh my God, you have the Jatun album”. They don’t have their own distinct sound – they’re like a Dntel-lite, or countless other similar-sounding bands.
But don’t get me wrong, the music isn’t bad. But unfortunately for me as a reviewer, it’s the kind of music that is impossible to describe. There’s beats and blips and stuff, but no riffage, mad drum solos, or the band smashing up their instruments at the end. And only in random spasmodic places are there any vocals. As you can see, I’m having a tough job trying to say something positive about this album. They say (by that I mean my grandmother, and people of her generation) that “if you don’t have anything good to say, don’t say anything at all”. I wish this was my problem, I do have good things to say – just no idea how to say them.
Coming home on the train the other day I was reading the newspaper while listening to this album, and I found it works perfectly as the background soundtrack to various events in your daily life. It wouldn’t work as muzak in an elevator, but it does work well as ambient sounds on your mp3 player.
‘Zombie Hotel’ and ‘Young Crooks’ are the best songs on the album. But like the rest of this review, it’s hard to tell why. Probably because they wouldn’t be out of place on a Dntel album. And also because I’ve given them four stars on my iPod. But then again, there’s a Phil Collins song with four stars on my iPod. So what does that say about Jatun? Or what does that say about me?
Tracks to Hear: Zombie Hotel, Young Crooks, Viola and the Case
Score: 6.2
This album is like the meaning of life: impossible to explain, hurts your brain if you focus on it too much, but is always there at the back of things waiting for you to go back to it, and try and find out its secrets again.
- Ronan Hunt-Murphy