It is hard to believe that Jimi Tenor‘s first solo album, the bedroom confection Sähkömies that blended cheap synthetic beats and electronics with his signature romantic saxophone, is thirty years old.
To celebrate, Bureau B have taken it upon themselves to make it available again and not before time. Over eight unlikely tracks and forty intriguing minutes, Jimi takes us on a trip through his mind, paring the analogue with the synthetic in a way that was unexpected at the time, but in reality was a matter of necessity.
Whatever the genesis though, what came out was strangely beguiling and due to the keenness of Tommi Gronland and Mika Vainio and their fledgling Puu label, so began a fascinating thirty year career. Despite the limitations of his home set-up (his sax had a plastic mouthpiece attached by tape), it didn’t impinge upon his imagination and desire to push synth music in new directions.Opener “Theme Sax”, with its space-age sweep and romantic sax is the ultimate scene setter. The deep, reedy sound and slow Bontempi beat feels cocooned form the world; music for loners, still awake at 4am looking out over an awakening cityscape, just starting the recovery from an unknown loss. Found voices from the ’60s sit the back of the mix on “Union Ave”, while the cotton wool synths tap away at the sultriest of sax lines, emerging tousle-haired form a warm bed, a soft focus smile like a distant memory.
The cheap, synthetic beats and exotica inspired synth lines have parallels with contemporary Stereolab and would have appealed to a similar audience, but there was also irony involved, at least it sounds like that to me. One of the two vocal tracks, “Take Me Babe”, is a sexed-up churn, its heavy murky beats and Berlin Bowie electronics and its uplift and comedown a little bit of a musical analogy. It is clever and strange, appealing to a certain sort of clubber as w ell as the bedroom listener. A love of space also makes its presence felt with the aimless slow-build concoction of “Matti B” and the computer games adrift ambience of “Voimamies”. Here, it shares space with a simplistic xylophone riff that is a great juxtaposition; momentum and stasis. The album bows out with the second vocal track; the slowest of synthetic heart monitor beats and the half-heard chords that undergo some simple speed surgery part way through cause a dreamlike vibe.Sähkömies is a fine album and one that wears its thirty years and budget recording extremely well. If you don’t know it, check it out and if you do, then dig it back out and watch the years fall away.
-Mr Olivetti-
