Faithless, No Roots (2004)

I was markedly more upbeat than usual when working to work this morning. I could credit this with any number of sensible causes - not least, sleeping almost entirely through the night for the first time in pretty much ever - but I prefer to credit it to the cheesey mid-2000s electronica I was listening to.

Nakedly (and arguably naively) political, No Roots is Faithless' fourth studio album and - unbelievably - their first (and, if I'm not mistaken, only) chart topping album. Unbelievable because their other albums were so damn good, but I guess you can't pick the taste of the charts. For what it's worth my general view is pretty much the exact opposite - the more Faithless grew in popularity, the less I liked their style. In fact, my favourite Faithless tracks are demos from the B-Sides of their first album. In my view their albums regress with time, so my top pick remains 'Reverence' (1995) followed by 'Sunday, 8pm' (1998), then 'Outrospective' (2001) with this as my least favourite. I stopped buying Faithless albums after this one.

So why is this is my least favourite of all their albums? Mostly because I unashamedly love Faithless for their quirky ballads and diverse style, not for their trip-hop dance anthems and sleek production. The band excels in eclecticism, and this album is self-consciously not eleclectic. The songs are short, sensibly grouped in two distinct halves, unified in genre, and written entirely in the key of C. It's deliberate and it's measured and it's polished and it all makes sense. Personally I just think Faithless' genius lies in their ability to make sense out of the scattered and non-sensical, rather than out of the deliberate and the sensible. This album also relies heavily on the smooth house / R&B sounds of the mid 2000s, sounds which I didn't like at the time and which I'm no more enamoured of now.

So, scathing commentary aside, why do I go back there? Well, there's something oddly comforting about the bands of my youth. Whether or not I agree with the sentiments, there'll always be something about Maxi's philosophical rants that stick. I love that he ties in throwbacks to 'Reverence', almost as though he's aware that the opening track of their first album was some kind of philosophical mission statement, and that he hasn't forgotten who they are and what they set out to do. There are some (albeit rare) remaining moments of rawness in the album, reminiscent of their live act, and which I cling to as evidence that they haven't become chart slaves. I was struck, this morning, by Dido's lovely voice - I had forgotten how spectacular she can sound. And finally, although it's not my thing anymore, sometimes some cheesey dance music really is a pick me up. It even kind of made me laugh at myself.

I've alluded before to Faithless as a former lover, and I stand by that. We're not getting back together, especially after they cheated on me with this strange polished deliberate style. But I remember why I loved them: cos, in the heady days of our youth (before they settled down and became marriage material) they were just. so. much. fun.