Owen Pallett, formerly known as Final Fantasy, is an incredible violinist, and an equally adept arranger of orchestral music. His newest offering,
Heartland, finds him shedding the Final Fantasy moniker in favor of his own name, which parallels the turn towards more personal lyrics and a more general feeling that this is indeed his project, his brain-child, his artistic achievements. And what an achievement
Heartland is: the album is orchestrated beautifully, as the strings and electronic flourishes make for his most emotionally intimate statement yet. And that certainly adds to its appeal; Pallett is creating an entirely new world through the sounds he is creating, and (paradoxically) that world allows the sounds to do things they couldn’t have done before. Pallett is channelling some recent classics with
Heartland, and the first few that come to mind are Joanna Newsom’s
Ys, Sufjan Stevens’
Illinois, and St. Vincent’s
Actor. Lyrically, the themes make it easy to draw comparisons between Pallett “coming in to his own” and the trials of going on a search for personal discovery. There are moments of profound realization, deep crises of faith, complete loss of hope, and empowering belief in great powers. He’s destroying himself to find himself anew, and he’s making a glorious sound while he’s at it. As twee as it all is, it’s got some sharp edges. If you sink into his world,
Heartland could destroy you, too. Owen Pallett, formerly known as Final Fantasy, is an incredible violinist, and an equally adept arranger of orchestral music. His newest offering,
Heartland, finds him shedding the Final Fantasy moniker in favor of his own name, which parallels the turn towards more personal lyrics and a more general feeling that this is indeed his project, his brain-child, his artistic achievements. And what an achievement
Heartland is: the album is orchestrated beautifully, as the strings and electronic flourishes make for his most emotionally intimate statement yet. And that certainly adds to its appeal; Pallett is creating an entirely new world through the sounds he is creating, and (paradoxically) that world allows the sounds to do things they couldn’t have done before. Pallett is channelling some recent classics with
Heartland, and the first few that come to mind are Joanna Newsom’s
Ys, Sufjan Stevens’
Illinois, and St. Vincent’s
Actor. Lyrically, the themes make it easy to draw comparisons between Pallett “coming in to his own” and the trials of going on a search for personal discovery. There are moments of profound realization, deep crises of faith, complete loss of hope, and empowering belief in great powers. He’s destroying himself to find himself anew, and he’s making a glorious sound while he’s at it. As twee as it all is, it’s got some sharp edges. If you sink into his world,
Heartland could destroy you, too.
1. “Midnight Directives” – 3:36
2. “Keep the Dog Quiet” – 3:10
3. “Mount Alpentine” – 0:49
4. “Red Sun No. 5″ – 3:41
5. “Lewis Takes Action” – 2:54
6. “The Great Elsewhere” – 5:50
7. “Oh Heartland, Up Yours!” – 4:07
8. “Lewis Takes Off His Shirt” – 5:08
9. “Flare Gun” – 2:21
10. “E Is for Estranged” – 5:25
11. “Tryst with Mephistopheles” – 6:53
12. “What Do You Think Will Happen Now?” – 2:38
GENRE: Dream Pop, Indie Pop.
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Promoted in the summer of 2002 by its title track featuring on a Lexus car ad, Open Heart Zoo received an adulatory press welcome, one reviewer going so far as to claim "albums like this come along once in a decade and artists like Martin Grech once in a lifetime". And, for once, the stratospheric praise is not far off the mark. At age 12, Aylesbury-born Grech, blown away by Radiohead's The Bends and lent confidence by his singer mother, began to write, sing and play. At 16, he entered a London studio and, 3 years later, emerged with this, one of the most startling debuts in ages. The opening three numbers immediately announce that something special is up. "Here It Comes", the title track and the first single, "Dali", evolve from monolithic sci-fi rock, through weird and beautiful orchestrations to a punishing metal. Then there's the quiet lullaby of "Tonight", the softly hypnotic "Penicillin" and the near-ambient "Catch Up", all of it riddled with well-chosen samples and overlaid with Grech's extraordinary voice, like Muse's Matt Bellamy's but genuinely soulful and far less blustering. Incredibly, for one so young, this is truly inventive rock, following a line from Soundgarden, through Radiohead to 2002, with the production atmospherics of Bjork and Robin Guthrie tossed in for extra effect. There's surely a chance Martin Grech has peaked before he's 20. But what a peak.
