Thelast few years have been a pretty interesting time for pop andelectronic music. As the technological side of music has gained morecredibility as an art form, it's taken on some more "traditional"facets which have spun off a bunch of interesting hybrids that continueto collide and fuse amongst themselves. Man, the Manipulator,the second release from the Chicago art school duo of Shawn King andNate Flanigan as Soulo, is a prime example of how mixing laid back,orchestrated pop songwriting with various areas of electronic music canremain focused without leaning too heavily in one general direction andstill be very "musical" in the traditional sense. The warmth ofacoustic guitar and Theremin-like whistling keyboard on the intro of"How Do You Feel?" remains throughout the addition of relaxed machinebeats, bass end and the near squelch of keyboards, even when it dropsout for some simple, yet effective organ licks. The ethereal "Emotions,Can You Trust Them?" builds from the murkiness of synth ambience tosoft vocals and pitch bending bass peppered with piano, held togetherwith a rhythm so laid-back that you could drive a truck between thebeats. "Born Female" blurs backwards guitar and violin into an almostcall and response melodic line over Rhodes piano, thickeningelectro-bass and crisp machine beats for a sweetness that's summed upin all of two minutes. Rounding out the disc's twelve tracks, "ThePeter Principle" opens with a scratchy punch-in-the-gut rhythm,electro-chaos, feedback and heavy metal power chords that drag it in araunchy direction only to subside in intensity once upright bass,trumpet, violin, clarinet and banjo (yes, banjo) come quickly to theforefront. It's quirky, yet makes perfect sense and totally works. Atjust over thirty-eight minutes, the bulk of the disc's tracks are inand around the three minute mark, which tends to be a bit brief forsome ideas to play out and be embellished. By the same token, Soulo'ssparingly used clever and popish hooks are more effective in thismanner than listening to them repeat a thousand times so as to addanother synth module.Read More
