Yann Tiersen
Irving Plaza
Friday, April 27
Better than: Most of the Philip Glass and Stephin Merritt music I’ve heard.
Skylinef, Yann Tiersen’s seventh studio album, is only the second album of his current deal with Anti- and, like 2010’s Dust Lane, it pioneers sonic territory structurally different from the old-fashioned chansons that have been on heavy rotation in downtown Manhattan bistros for months. Gone are the sparse, folk-inflected dreamscapes people remember from 2005’s Les Retrouvailles or the twin 2001 releases of L’Absente and Yann’s score to the French film Amélie. Fewer acoustic instruments appear, and those that do are distorted or displaced by vintage synthesizer textures. Instead he gives us propulsive drums and wailing guitars hot enough to rival early Roxy Music. Continue reading “Live: Yann Tiersen Gets Playful at Irving Plaza”