Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

INTERVIEWS, REVIEWS & RELATED ARTICLES

The Boston Phoenix NOVEMBER 16, 2011 - by Jonathan Donaldson

BRIAN ENO: PANIC OF LOOKING

For those who enjoyed Brian Eno's collaboration with English poet Rick Holland from earlier this year, Drums Between The Bells, this follow-up EP may be a nice digestif. For everybody else, don't expect anything too impressive from Panic Of Looking, a short collection of afterthoughts from Eno and Holland's exchanges. The centrepiece of the collection is the title track, which features Holland's gloomy, hyper-tactile voice reciting against a gently dissonant, almost organic-industrial backing-track from Eno. Whether the artists have stumbled upon a conceptual breakthrough regarding the push and pull between words and music is within the prerogative of the beholder - to some, the results might just sound like The Fall with a clean shirt and nice haircut. If any real rewards are to be reaped from this collaboration, they would have to come from repeated listens to Holland's words. Though Eno is adequate, moments where he takes over the collaboration (such as on West Bay and Watch A Single Swallow In A Thermal Sky, And Try To Fit Its Motion, Or Figure Why It Flies) are too under-nourished and ponderous to suggest that he's giving us something new.