Armchair Electronica 2.0: Moby, 'Wait for Me'

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THERE'S REALLY ONLY one way to determine if an artist has made it to the big time: Whether or not he has an entire Wikipedia page devoted to his discography.

Electronic-melody master Moby doesn't disappoint with his own venerable list, with a good portion consisting of remix and collaborative projects. It's also striking how many of his projects feature voices other than his — he sings occasionally, but even when he doesn't, his songs still retain that definitive Moby sound. It's a sound that transcends just "rich" or "textured"; rather, each track is packed full of details like an entire movie, or a description of someone's life from birth to death. Finding out that the musician does most of his recording in his own apartment studio makes sense, because of the personal, hand-crafted feel of each sustained note.

"Wait for Me" (Little Idiot/Mute) Moby's ninth studio album, is a welcome addition to his canon. It lacks the spirited party tunes like "Southside" or "Ooh Yeah," opting instead for an introverted, stirring set of tracks more like "Porcelain," best heard with headphones instead of on the dance floor.

Always one for bizarre experiments in sound creation, Moby teamed up with producer Ken Thomas, of noise enthusiasts Sigur Ros, to produce tracks like "Stock Radio," which is a broken Bakelite radio run through broken effects pedals. Random thumps, strums and vocal snippets permeate the album, creating a surreal cityscape of almost-noiseless crowds going about their days to an emotive ambient soundtrack.

The first single "Pale Horses" is, pretty simply, a masterpiece. It's equally as good on its own or with the accompanying video, but it helps if you're prepared to sit still for a good while and let it all sink in a few times. "Pale Horses" evokes such a range of emotions, par for the course for Moby — it's sad, certainly, but almost empowering, and gloomy but not hopeless. It speaks to the producer's abilities that such a poignant song ("Put me on the train, send me back to my home / Couldn't live without you when I tried to roam / Put me by the window, let me see outside / Looking at the places where all my family died") can be played on repeat without resorting to the maudlin or the absolutely depressing.

The other single, "Shot in the Back of the Head," is accompanied by a video directed, appropriately, by David Lynch, the black-and-white scenes desperately understating the song's power to stunning effect.

The other colorful songs, ranging from 90 seconds to 5 minutes, are best heard when supported by each other, like any great electronic album that's more about a general effect than individual hooks. Moby may have the status now to forgo any worries about marketability, but "Wait For Me" just more proof that he's brilliant even when he doesn't have to be.

Written by Express contributor Afton Lorraine Woodward

Photo courtesy Danny Clinch