Reviews
Mia Doi Todd
La Ninja: Amor & Other Dreams of Manzanita
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Add to del.ico.us.Review Date: 2006-05-07
Apart from having the strangest album title I’ve seen in a long time, and releasing a remix album, Mia Doi Todd is a name I had never heard before last week. In fact when Dan told me that this album was right up my alley, and that I was “the perfect one to review it”, I think he was just trying to punish me over some album review/rating we didn’t agree on. Like how the hell are you supposed to review a remix album? And furthermore, how the hell are you to review a remix album of songs you’ve never heard the originals of? Well, maybe that is the best way to review any album – not in comparison to what has gone before, but just by reviewing what you see in front of you.
Mia Doi Todd is a singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. (I actually thought it was a band name!) Her past albums were most acoustic-based, but she has worked with experimental artists such as Dntel, who pop up here too. The album opens with ‘What If We Do? [Nobody Remix]’ which never really seems to set the world alight for me. The song underneath seems solid enough, albeit repetitive. And Mia Doi Todd (I’m unsure where her first name starts and her surname begins) has a nice Sinead O’Connor type voice.
‘Amor [Adventure Time Remix]’ is an improvement, on the opener, but maybe this is cause the song underneath is a better starting-point. The song is full of echoes, and the instrumentation never seems to overpower it. Continuing the Irish comparison, this song could easily have been released by Enya. ‘Norwegian Wood’ is not a remix, but a cover of a Beatles tune. Terri noted that her voice sounds plummy here, but what ‘plummy’ actually is I’ll never know. How can you sound like a fruit? “Jeez, that Jagger fella’ sure sounds appley on the new album.” As for the song itself, fruitiness aside, it’s a good cover of a fairly well known song. Unfortunately, she doesn’t add anything new, and the song could well have done with a remix itself.
There are three different remixes of ‘My Room Is White’ on the album, and you’d think that it’d get quite tedious after a while. The ‘[Dungen Remix]’ is the first of the three, and really does sound like an Enya song. It has some neat little percussion, and an interesting recurring background riff. The ‘[Reminder Remix]’ is little more than a reminder that you’ve heard this song earlier – it seems to add nothing to the song. This is followed immediately by the ‘[Flying Lotus Remix]’, which is the best of the three, and seems like a totally different song. Around the 1:30 mark, the song even has a section which sounds like it was plundered straight out of a video game. Most of the lyrics are left out, and if only this and the [Dungen Remix] were on the album, it would have been much better for the listener.
There are only two remixes of ‘Muscle, Bone & Blood’ here. This is a blessing and a disappointment, as the two remixes are two of the best tracks on the album. The ‘[Ammoncontact Remix]’ is a very simple, light percussion-led song, featuring the ultimate instrument: wind-chimes. There’s also some xylophone in the song, which I sincerely approve of. The ‘[Chessie Remix]’ is almost twice the length, clocking in at over six minutes. The first two and a half of which must have been recorded inside a submarine, as they have a very underwater feel. The song is reminiscent of Bjork (the mental Bjork, not the pop Bjork). This is never a bad thing!
Many readers may not realise they know Dntel. Their song, ‘This is the Dream of Evan and Chan’ featured Ben Gibbard of Death Cab For Cutie. Following its success, Gibbard joined with Dntel’s Jimmy Tamborello to form The Postal Service. Tamborello’s brilliance is shown once again here on ‘Deep at Sea [Dntel Remix]’ which is what The Postal Service would have sounded like with female lead vocals. Dntel really need to remix more stuff! ‘The Last Night of Winter [Campanella/Hellie Remix]’ begins with MDT singing a cappella before introducing the melody. Following on from Dntel, this song may have sounded poor by comparison, but it impresses throughout. The lyrics are impossible to hear, that may be the sound of aliens, some of it sounds like it’s being played backwards, and it’s one of the longest tracks on the album; but it has that certain something. You can’t pick out the individual section which makes a Jackson Pollock brilliant – it just all adds up to brilliance. It’s the same story here.
Both ‘Kokoro’ and ‘Shikibu’ are not remixes. ‘Shikibu’ is an instrumental song, while ‘Kokoro’ highlights Mia Doi Todd’s voice with some excellent trilling. It’s a sparse acoustic number, and contrasts sharply with most of what has gone before (and what comes after). Since this is a remix album, there’s little chance to comment on the lyrics, but the line “Extreme happiness brings extraordinary pain” is especially of note here. ‘Shikibu [Instrumental]’ would not go down well with either Terri or Brandon – neither have a love for instrumental tracks. Ahhh, now I see why Dan gave me this album. He knew I wouldn’t write it off because it hasn’t many words in it. Lucky he did, because otherwise I never would have given it a listen (even with the Jimmy Tamborello connection). ‘Shikibu’, lives up to its name, and is a very Japanese-sounding song.
Tracks to Download: ‘Deep at Sea [Dntel Remix]’, ‘The Last Night of Winter [Campanella/Hellie Remix], My Room Is White [Flying Lotus Remix], Muscle Bone & Blood [Ammoncontact Remix]
Score: 7.3
On first listen I probably would have written this off too. But the more you listen the more you notice about it. It could have done with greater variety though, and thus would have resulted in a better score.
- Ronan Hunt-Murphy