KEY POINTS:
Herald rating: * *
Air have always been innovative enough to avoid being lumped into the uncool chill-out genre. Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunkel's last album Talkie Walkie was dynamic enough to have been a film soundtrack; their work on the film Virgin Suicides also showcased their music's cinematic quality.
Pocket Symphony, though quintessentially Air, veers between the bland electronica you hear in airports and some kind of odd Asian space trip. Somewhere Between Waking and Sleeping seems to sum up the duo's state of mind in the studio.
A listen through headphones reveals Air's always impressive production skills, a marriage of organic and synthesised sounds that ebb and flow through the earpiece, fine-tuned by experienced producer Nigel Godrich. The tunes, however, just ain't that memorable. Throw all the xylophones, lilting pianos and Japanese string instruments into the mix you like, Once Upon a Time still sounds like the poor man's version of Kelly Watch the Stars. Even Jarvis Cocker's somnolent drawl on One Hell of A Party, which sounds more like a hangover, can't bring this alive.
That feeling of deja vu continues, although it could have something to do with the mindless lyrics of Napalm Love: "I'm falling down, falling down, down on the ground" or because Mer Du Japon sounds like something Jane Fonda might have done a low-impact routine to in the 80s.
If you knew enough about music software, you could probably make any basic musical interlude sound pleasant enough. Embellish piano chords with freaky sound effects and voila: Mayfair Song, a track with all the pleasurable staying power of a warm bath - it's only comforting for so long.
It's not until Photograph that Air flex their creative muscles to create something spine-tingling and surreal. Although it has all the Air nuances - piano arpeggios, eerie vocals, twinkling xylophones - it has enough angular turns to infuse the album with a magic it otherwise lacks.
The rest is probably what it's like to float in space: soothing and pretty but dull after a while.
Verdict: Dull, paint-by-numbers Air album from normally quirky Frenchies
