Looper
She’s a Knife
Mute
Taken from Looper’s slightly perplexing, but most fully realized concept album, The Snare, “She’s a Knife” actually benefits from this single status. A song awash in vibraphone and UK Garage beats doesn’t amount to much on an album swimming in similar sounding tracks. Alone, however, the song becomes much more palatable, even likeable. Stuart David’s menacing soul singing is even upstaged by guest vocalists Elaine Lavelle and Debbie Poole. These two control the choruses and are the only remnants to make it through the battery of manipulation on the two subsequent remix tracks.
The first of these remixes, courtesy of Ladytron’s Daniel Hunt, eliminates the heavier beats of the original, replacing them with tinnier distorted percussion and some eerie church organ. The final track, “All Diamonds”, is actually credited to Looper member Ronnie Black as a new song. The makings of a remix still remain as the song’s title and refrain comes from a sampled lyric fragment from the title track. With its driving bass line, wonderfully obviously synth drums, and “Trainspotting” atmosphere the song sounds somewhat like a decade-old cousin of Underworld’s “Born Slippy”. The history lesson is nice, but maybe next time the band could revisit 1999’s ‘Up a Tree’ again, if only for one track. Please?
Mute Records: http://www.mute.com • Looper: http://www.looper.info/
