Album Review: The Avalanches - Wildflower

Are you so relieved The Avalanches are finally releasing their 16-years-in-the-making second album that you've already given it a five-star rating before pressing play or can you not move past Wildflower's gestation period? When the tuba-enhanced voodoo magic of Frankie Sinatra (ft Danny Brown and MF Doom) dropped, it caused a reaction akin to jumping into the tub of the phosphorescent ice cream featured in the song's inspired music video. Sadly, nothing else on this album reaches that song's zenith.

Since Since I Left You landed in 2000, Gorillaz, 2manyDJs, mash-ups and shortening attention spans have made us accustomed to schizophrenic sounds. And Wildflower's Biz Markie-featuring The Noisy Eater certainly evokes Superfast Jellyfish by Gorillaz (Brian Wilson's Vegetables is cited as the song's "direct inspiration").

More sonic art piece than album, we always knew Wildflower would incorporate a feast of samples and encourage us to further explore the snippets we dig (Chandra's Subways and Warm Ride by Bee Gees plus that cosmic kids band playing The Beatles' Come Together!). There's also live instrumentation — bowed saw, mellotron, Warren Ellis playing violin (Stepkids) — vinyl pops and crackles, computer game sound effects, traffic noise and vibrant sounds of life happening. Street recordings allow us to eavesdrop snatches of conversation; the listener becomes flaneur. If you took heaps of acid and thought you could 'hear' a kaleidoscope, it would sound a lot like Wildflower. 

Will punters holler to hear tracks from this album (other than Frankie Sinatra) at Avalanches live shows, though?