Volume CXXXIII, Number 17 February 22, 2002 f

Chemical Brothers react well with listeners
JUSTIN BOYNTON
STAFF WRITER

In Come With Us, the Chemical Brothers transcend the confining pursuit of the great pop electronic dance song, and create an astonishingly complex and beautiful album. No simple sing-along ditties powered primarily by a guest rapper or singer here. Rather, each song is lushly layered and intensively melodic. The resulting album is an entire musical experience instead of a collection of commercially viable tracks. Come With Us is an example of electronic music pushed toward its zenith, instead of packaged for the masses.

Which is not to say the masses won't dance to this. It's tough to think of anyone who wouldn't. In their more than 10 years behind the turntables, Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands have mastered the production of beats that fuel dance crowds. It is their manipulation of and addition to these beats, though, that puts flesh on the songs' skeletons. The title track begins with a robotic voice simultaneously inviting and commanding: "Come with us and leave your earth behind." Nothing surprising there. But while the robot is talking, the build-up subtly begins. When the robot cuts out, the song splashes into a raging sea of fuzz and synth glissandos. The sounds of "It Began in Afrika" are the sounds of midnight on an electronic safari, complete with the static howls of digital hyenas and the plaintive machine-made cries of their prey.

This song crescendos toward the end, whistling like a kettle about to blow, before exploding into a blast of tribal drums. "Star Guitar" simulates space travel as the song alternates between blazing through hyperspace and floating freely among the stars. With the soft and sweet comedown of "Hoops," the Brothers nearly lull you to sleep, but the almost painfully grating bass in "My Elastic Eye" kicks you in the stomach and throws you back on the dance floor. When you finally stop gasping, you are glad you're there. And just when you begin to get tired again, the cool, crisp, easy voice of Beth Orton comes in and it's off to space on the wings of electric angels.

"Denmark" and "Galaxy Bounce" return to earth as obvious and motivating dance songs. For the second-to-last track, Tom and Ed surprisingly make the harpsichord sound new and pleasant as it zips and crashes through "Pioneer Skies". In the end, it's the Chemical Brothers and their tools of electronica versus the swagger and skill of Richard Ashcroft's voice. There is a tension as Ashcroft almost dominates the track before the Brothers harness his energy and construct the most enduring song of the album.

Perhaps the most amazing feature of Come With Us is how little tension exists between the beat and the surrounding music. The tracks do not sound like decorated dance beats-they sound like melodic, though extremely danceable, songs. With this coalescence, the Chemical Brothers create their finest album.