Bring Back the Buffalo: s/t
Persona

Stewart Walker takes a surprising left turn on Bring Back the Buffalo (both group name and album title), a collaborative outing with Marco Tonni (aka Touane). The duo eschews instrumental techno for melodic electronic pop of a Styrofoam-The Postal Service vintage with vocals appearing on ten of the hour-long album's fourteen songs. Instrumentally, these hook-filled modern campfire songs include a healthy share of appealing moments, many of them guitar-related: the skipping pulses and razor-blade guitars of “Cage of the Frame,” the Spanish-flavoured and country-tinged picking in “Last Century” and “Far and Far,” respectively, and the attractive six-string weave that graces “Not Up to You”; in addition, Tonni contributes a delicately dreamy instrumental of silken guitar strums and clicking beats (“Guitar Fishing”).

Unfortunately the album is marred by the merely passable singing (no clarification of whether Walker and Tonni share vocal duties is provided) which, while not horrid by any stretch, often lacks character; the rote vocal delivery heard in “Checkerboards” and “Conceal the Inside,” for example, contrasts sharply with the songs' lush backings of sparkling electronics and glistening guitars. The closer “Breakfast at Sophia's” is a rare instance where the singing and backing impress equally; in this case, the softer vocal delivery exudes greater character and is more appealing as a result. Bring Back the Buffalo may be an interesting departure for Walker and Tonni but it's not a wholly convincing one.

October 2005