From their start, Melbourne’s Architecture in Helsinki were a big, bombastic dance-collective, but odd in an Australian way, kind of a twenty-first century version of odd eighties Aussies like Men at Work. Even when losing two members in 2006, the following year’s Places Like This (QRO review) was the band’s biggest yet. However, down yet another member (to ‘only’ five), Helsinki’s Moment Bends reduces the group’s sound. While not without qualities, in this case, less is less.
Moment Bends isn’t a bad album; it’s just that Architecture in Helsinki has shrunk the sound that earned the band their cult audience, without really growing in any other way. From the simple vocals + Casio of opener "Desert Island" on, Bends feels as comparatively small and parched as said island. This is done better when the band gets brighter, and correspondingly bigger, on "Yr Go To" and "I Know Deep Down", but those are the exceptions, not the rule. The group still knows its way around a beat, and the reduction does give co-singer Kellie Sutherland more chance to shine (such as, in both cases, on single "That Beep"), but by "Denial Style", it feels almost like a remix of Architecture in Helsinki, not their new album.
Architecture in Helsinki’s big sound was probably an exhausting one to do (especially live – QRO live review), but it was a rewarding one. With Moment Bends, they’ve gone smaller in every way.
MP3 Stream: "I Know Deep Down"
