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05.12.2005

Enik – "The Seasons In Between"

His unique voice on the last Funkstörung album "Disconnected" may still reverberate in audible memories. Enik, a then 23 year old singer from Munich, sang the reputed Bavarian deconstruction duo from its electronica basement up in to pop level. That was in 2004. At almost the same time he made his debut with the 6 track EP "Without A Bark" on Wonder Records, a piece free of courtesy, whose wild-stylistic peculiarities might well have found friends and foes in equal numbers.

With "The Seasons In Between", Enik presents his first complete album, that comes in overflowlingly equipped with 14 songs documenting his as comfort free as possible artistic course through life. Enik prefers to write his songs all alone and he's also recorded various self-taught instruments like bass, guitar and percussions himself. Along with some guest musicians playing drums, saxophone and trumpet is Hans Tauschek, who not only contributes cello and piano, but also enjoys the privilege among friends, to co-write three songs with Enik.

Eniks music is strong meat. Nothing that form-and-norm aethetes would want to chew on, "The Seasons In Between" rather caters to what chain-smoking art devourers like to listen to. There is artpop, distorted blues, jazz romance, prog and rock eccentric, dramatic melodies and playhouse electronics, conjunct in anti-authoritarian arrangements that seem to be tied up by the loose ends of numerous threads. There is brusque and bulky songwriter stuff like "Rebro" or "Friendly Drifter", whose brute tenor is being corrupted with sweet and melodious moments. A dark-elektro hit like "Why Do You Love Me", or roughneck-R&B styles as in "No Fire", "Warm Space" and maybe "Kids", too, boogies at least with one dancing leg in a tolerant club. Classically conducted, heartfelt pop ballads like the album title "The Seasons In Between", or the song "Unhealthy Smoke" feature sensitive string passages and enticing harmonies, thus standing up as a witness to well and true musicality. "Uncomfortably", a chanson with a big band, but also the slow-motion-thriller "Smashing The Glasses" provide information on Eniks jazz past. The same for "The Stolen Eyelight", a song that gorgeously allows for reading in to Eniks attitude towards art, in case you would want to find hidden clues for sources of breathing in and out (Björk? Burroughs?). With "Small Finger", "No Love" and "Safety", Enik finally clambers the first legs on his way to pop Olympus. Whoever wants to sound a self-confident echo to titans like David Bowie out of this, may well do so.

Enik’s means of expression derive from less the opulence of cinema, but rather the sparse over-acted performance of theater, when he builds his music like a stage design for his protagonist voice. That makes sense, because Enik is a vocal monster, a singing hydra with at least nine voice boxes, of which at least one strives for immortality. His lyrics remain more poetic than concrete and outline an emotional horizon that is free to be painted by the listeners themselves. Enik has an intuitive approach towards art. He takes no stock in well-crafted concepts in mind, on the contrary he tries to get rid of all the things learned, just to advance to the essence of his personality. This rebellion against himself might look egocentric, self-destructive above all, but it also corresponds to a thoroughly honest, almost childlike unpretentious attitude, that has never done damage to art. It makes Enik incorrupt. And opportunism would be the last thing anyone would blame his music for.


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