Like Phew‘s first album, this collaborative jewel was recorded in Conny Plank‘s legendary studio in Cologne. For the occasion, Chrislo Haas of Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft fame gathered a few like minds to soundscape the surrounds.
Alexander Hacke (Einstürzende Neubauten) on guitar, Thomas Stern (Crime And The City Solution) on bass and Can‘s drummer Jaki Liebezeit, who was no stranger to collaborating with Phew, having worked on her solo debut with Holger Czukay way back in ‘81.
Our Likeness was my first experiences of Phew’s vocal prowess, the CD initially acquired because of the Neubauten and DAF connection, and she blew me clean away with her dextrous free-form approach, something that the sporadic music totally enhanced. Singing exclusively in Japanese, she gave each track a sense of mystery, teased by the translated liner notes that beam with an elemental simplicity. Repeated mantras that knot in your head, spin in the textural construct like little prayers to existence.The first track embraces the fractal grace of traditional Japanese music (to a degree) and has her voice weaving intones that butterfly percussive curls and shimmering imbalances. A spell-form whose hum-like qualities are thrown to the title track’s playfulness, seeing her vocals hiccup‘n’skip around a soft see-sawing centre. A pop-like airiness that tonally shifts / enthuses with some lovely heavy blasts of guitar and bass. A weird sense of unexpected emphasis that feels almost dream-like, fluidly fascinated.
Each track has its own personality, the vocal styling always shifting, revealing fresh perspectives, phonically fluttering between quiet reflection and impassioned yelps. Love the intense percussive gallop of the next track “Being”, Liebezeit’s drumming is just amazing, twinning with Phew’s guttural, samurai-like animus completely. A great slice of insanity the cute jazz-like shivers of “Like Water And Water” dial things down from, lubricated by Chrislo’s saxophone slivers and Hacke’s pinned-back piano.
The abstracted “Smell” is like a rewrite of “Do-Re-Mi” in a dot-dash-dot of discord and itchy quietness. An arty bit of mischief that moves seamlessly into the Neubauten-like outcrop of “Depth Of The Forehead”, her weaving words embracing a driving insistent groove. One of the album’s many highlights that introduces a sense of adventure which cascades through the next three tracks without a gap. I really love when an album does that (don’t you?), lost in the ply of the moment, accidentally caught up in a creative avalanche.
A trio of tracks that starts on the scatter cushion and unhinged cartoon-ish tumble of “Our Element”, full of errant xylophonics and sonic-whisked contours that literally smash into the clattering intoxication of “Expression”. A funky fly-over, giddy in dramatic mood swings and paramedical emergency — a true wow moment that bends your head and pulls your speakers in unusual shapes.A nose diving fade-out that heralds another fave experience of mine, the Crime And The City Solution-like late night cellar bar chill pill of “Ocean”. Phew’s vocals here all hushed seduction to amber filled tumblers and swirling smoke, a closed-eye sonic that puts a fitting end to the odyssey.
Our Likeness is an understated masterpiece that still sounds as fresh now as when I first heard it back in the early ‘90s.-Michael Rodham-Heaps-
