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Album Reviews
Album Review: Maximilian Hecker – One Day (Louisville Records)
By Marc Samuels | Published on Monday 15 June 2009
Formerly a Kitty Yo artist, German singer-songwriter Maximilian Hecker fitted right in with that label’s blend of mavericks and oddballs with his off-kilter romantic lo-fi synth-pop. His fifth album sees him on Louiseville and whilst his beautiful voice (think Morten Harket-style loveliness) still aches with lovelorn melancholy just as before, the instrumentation has been padded out somewhat. Whereas earlier albums were essentially bedroom electronic affairs, ‘One Day’ has a more organic feel, which would be fine were it not for the fact that the sameness of the sound starts to tire after a while. At its best it is quite lovely (‘The Space That You’re In’ is like a less bombastic Coldpay and pleasingly redolent of Hecker’s earlier work). But too much of the album just resorts to generic anthemic indie clichés – think string-drenched guitar-pop of the sort Richard Ashcroft has made a solo career out of. It’s by no means a disaster – and the voice makes it all seem much better than it should – but you do wish some of the edginess from his earlier work would still be present; ‘One Day’ is pleasant and inoffensive but simply too pedestrian at times. MS
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