Brian Eno and Rick Holland - Panic of Looking

  by Andy Cassidy

published: 29 / 11 / 2011

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Review

Despite his work with bloated corporate rockers U2 and the unabashedly banal Coldplay, I still have a soft spot for Brian Eno. Described as a mini-album, 'Panic of Looking' is a collection of six songs which were recorded during the sessions for Brian Eno and Rick Holland’s 2011 collaboration 'Drums Between the Bells'. The album is made up of six instrumental pieces of Eno’s, five of which have poems by Rick Holland recited over them. Musically, 'Panic of Looking' is typical Eno, with slow piano progressions and gentle, ambient synthesisers providing a lush pillow of sounds. The lugubrious pace of the music is never challenging but there is enough on each piece to hold one’s interest. The poetry aspect of the album was, for me, a real let-down. Spoken word tracks often do not bear repeated listening, and unfortunately the five pieces on which Rick Holland has input reflect this. The poetry itself is a little adolescent in places, for example on 'Not a Story' where Holland asks his muse to “excite me [him]” and then talks about his sex-face and excretions, but overall it’s not jarringly bad – it simply doesn’t seem to sit comfortably with the music. On some tracks this incongruity is emphasised by the half-spoken, half-sung delivery of Holland’s poems – imagine a collaboration between Jacques Brel and the Orb and you’ll get the idea. In terms of quality, Eno’s musical output has not, on this evidence, diminished over the years – the pieces are reminiscent of his Ambient series in places. His judgement when choosing a collaborator, however, seems somewhat remiss if this album and 'Drums Between the Bells' are anything to go by – can this mini-LP really be from the man who collaborated on Bowie’s 'Berlin' trilogy? Panic of Looking is, essentially, a smaller sister record to 'Drums Between the Bells'. If you enjoyed 'Drums Between the Bells', then you will find a great deal in these six tracks. If not, I’d stick with Eno’s earlier work, particularly the 'Ambient' series and 1975’s seminal 'Another Green World'.

Track Listing:-

1 In The Future
2 Not A Story
3 Panic Of Looking
4 If These Footsteps
5 Watch A Single Swallow In A Thermal Sky
6 West Bay

Band Links:-

https://www.facebook.com/brianenomusic
http://enohyde.com/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoWPC
http://www.rjholland.com/
https://www.facebook.com/Story-the-Flo
https://twitter.com/RickHollandPoet/

Label Links:-

http://warp.net/
https://www.facebook.com/warprecords
https://twitter.com/warprecords
https://www.youtube.com/user/warprecor