Morcheeba - Fragments of Freedom

Morcheeba were once the dreamiest bass-heavy, slow funk-oriented group in all of trip-hopdom, as anyone who's spent time with their 1998 sophomore album, Big Calm, will attest. Fragments of Freedom begins interestingly enough, with the languorous, slide guitar-enhanced track "World Looking In." But things go awry from there; the lyrics are so daft and pale, and the R&B-lite arrangements so limp, that the listener keeps waiting for the group to bust out laughing, then introduce the real music. "Let It Go," with its faux-inspirational chorus and tepid keyboard runs, sounds like the Euro-club music they might play at Epcot Center. By the time Biz Markie shows up with a short, sweet track of old-school boasting halfway through, it's far too late to save this CD. Freedom sounds like a misdirected attempt to reach a larger audience; the result is as appealing as cotton candy that's been dipped in maple syrup, covered with vanilla frosting, and then dropped in the sand. Recommended only as a clear example of how not to make interesting dance-pop with wide appeal. --Mike McGonigal Amazon.com

NO stars is more appropriate

You've read it before: this is horrible, spine tingling, embarassing stuff! Morcheeba went from making a classic first album (Who Can You Trust?) and a really good sophomore release (Big Calm) to THIS piece of garbage? Unbelievable!

As I said in a different review, this album PROVES that the exit of Skye Edwards (after 2002's Charango) had absolutely nothing to do with the demise of Morcheeba, 'cause it really doesn't get much worse than this!

Only the title track deserves praise as being really good. The opening track "World Looking In" is okay, in that it MAY not give you the chills.

But everything else? DON'T BOTHER! There are plenty of less painful ways to inflict misery on oneself: root canal without anesthesia comes to mind as something I'd much rather try than to give this CD another listen. December 31, 2008

Awesome

I've got about 6000 tracks in my MP3 collection. Pretty much mostly I listen to is Mozart, sometimes Beethoven, Chopin, Metallica, and when I get bored of REAL music like that, I tend to go wandering through all the other stuff...

And Morcheeba is right up there. No doubt, beautiful, beautiful, gorgeous music. If you're open minded and love MUSIC (not genres or fashions), then listen to this... April 12, 2006

An ode to the 90's

How can a group fall as far as they did? "Who Can You Trust" and "Big Calm" were both classics (dispite the fact that they sounded totally different from one another). Now with "FoF" it just went down hill...and never came back! January 17, 2006

So bad... and not in a good way!

I want to respond to what a lot of other reviewers have said, here. I agree, the album is horribly boring. And it's absolutely fine to be a group that doesn't want to be labeled... genre-benders are the best in art, music, and literature. The issue I take with the album isn't simply that it's not trip hop, but that it's BAD. It's just poorly made music. Saying that "maybe they were purposefully trying to be corny with their lyrics" doesn't make the lyrics any less painful, nor does it save the poorly- and boringly-written tunes themselves. I'm simply not buying that this was some big experiment in sarcasm or irony. These are not "feel good" songs, they're "Ouch, are these really the same guys that did Trigger Hippie?" songs. December 14, 2005

Just Incredibly Boring

To my ears, the problem with "Fragments" isn't that Morcheeba is trying something new, the problem is that this effort fails so miserably at it. I like retro-funk-disco as much as anyone; I grew up with it, as a matter of fact (listen to Chris Joss or an Ursulla 1000 mix CD to see how much fun this genre can be). But this makes KC and the Sunshine Band sound inspired. It's not happy, it's not interesting rhythmically, and the melodies are about as memorable as a tone row in one of Arnold Schoenberg's later twelve tone compositions. Unlike most reviewers here, In my opionion WCYT and Big Calm are not all THAT great compared to the real classics of Trip Hop and Downtempo music (i.e Mezzanine and Mirror Conspiracy), but this is one of the blandest, most forgettable things I've had the misfortune to purchase in years. Maybe if it was entitled "music to wash dishes by"--its not overtly offensive like, for example, the new Brazilian Girls disc. But as a "major" work, by a "major" artist, forget it. September 18, 2005

More reviews at Amazon.com ...