Goldfrapp Seventh Tree CD

The fourth album from Goldfrapp establishes a new direction for the electronica duo. While their previous releases BLACK CHERRY and SUPERNATURE were steeped in dance and club music, SEVENTH TREE is dominated by acoustic textures, downtempo rhythms, and swirling ambient soundscapes. Where previous efforts were seemingly tailored for dancefloors, SEVENTH TREE is a late-night headphone album.

The album's first single, "A & E," for example, has singer Alison Goldfrapp employing her light, airy soprano in a relaxed, almost conversational style while trackmaker Will Gregory layers subtle synth lines and effects in a way that's warm and inviting. The lullaby-like "Little Bird" is equally lilting, opening into an expansive, ethereal passage reminiscent of the Cocteau Twins, while the delicate acoustic "Eat Yourself" is possibly the album's most heartbreaking and lovely moment. With SEVENTH TREE Goldfrapp proves itself capable of pushing into new, emotionally effecting musical directions without losing any of its much valued sonic breadth.

Seventh Tree (co-produced by Flood) is an album that confounds all that went before; warm and sensual and shimmering, it is the sound of a very British delirium, echoing the nonsense poetry of Edward Lear and the eccentricities of early Pink Floyd. This set includes the CD plus a bonus DVD of never before seen footage, videos and TV performances. Recorded in a 1960s bungalow in Bath, it was a conscious move to step away from the Weimar-esque strutting of earlier work and explore a more psychedelic terrain. Existing on the border between the realms of dreams and consciousness, surrealism and a magical realism, their music fits into a tradition of great British eccentricity and pop creativity.

Personnel: Goldfrapp (recorder).

Audio Mixer: Tony Hoffer.

Rolling Stone (p.59) - 3 stars out of 5 -- "[S]mart arrangements abound: 'A & E' rides a bittersweet, Feist-style chorus, and on 'Little Bird,' Goldfrapp sings eerie minor-key melodies over a bed of swirling keyboards and trip-hop drums."
Entertainment Weekly (p.61) - "[D]ialed-down....Very lovely..." -- Grade: B+
Uncut (p.100) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "SEVENTH TREE is Goldfrapp unplugged. It is a digital folk album. It is hand-knitted synth pop played around a campfire on dulcimers and autoharps and harmoniums."
CMJ - "It's an introspective piece, and also their most sedate record to date, soothing listeners with flawless female vocals waltzing over dreamy melodies."
Q (Magazine) (p.103) - "'Caravan Girl' is bright, summery pop, 'Cologne Cerrone Houdini' has a languid, Serge Gainsbourg feel..."
Mojo (Publisher) (p.103) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "[A] very English pastoral work, a lush and trippy affair with shades of Edward Lear-like surrealism and John Winston Lennon amid strawberry fields."
Mojo (Publisher) (p.67) - Ranked #38 in Mojo's "The 50 Best Albums Of 2008" -- "[A] tune-rich texture-fest that moistened eyes and tingled toes."
Blender (Magazine) (p.98) - 3.5 stars out of 5 -- "Goldrapp's voice remains extraordinary, as witchily sensual as Kate Bush's, as otherworldly as a theremin."
Harp (magazine) (p.102) - "[T]his new recording finds her in superb voice. More organic/simple instrumentation and lush cinematic soundscapes dominate here."
Paste (magazine) (p.76) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "Imagine Feist with more reserve than Canadian heartiness, and more interested in pristine sound beds than bubbly effusions."
The Word (magazine) (p.94) - "The opening 'Clowns' is an undeniably beautiful merengue, the likes of which you won't have heard since Scott Walker's 'Plastic Palace People'....SEVENTH TREE is mostly strings, gentle guitars and all thing bucolic."
Record Collector (magazine) (p.88) - 3 stars out of 5 -- "SEVENTH TREE is a grower; it's more pastel-tinted than the riotous neon of BLACK CHERRY or SUPERNATURE, but no less gorgeous."