Air are at it again, and they’re not just making another album. City Reading – Tre Storie Western does exactly what it says on the tin. Italian author Alessandro Baricco reads selections from his City novel over the usual swish Air soundbed. City is a highly acclaimed work on the Continent, garnering high praise for its urban meditations on the imaginative life of a mathematician. Baricco himself beautifully described the work as “a real joyride for the imagination.” Sadly, this exercise is far from being as exciting.
Air’s dreamy atmospherics are lost in the project. Baricco’s monotone dominates the proceedings because this is technically a spoken word album. It is rather mind-boggling why talents as sublime as Air’s should be so under-utilised. ‘Prologo Per La Puttana Di Closingtown’ is the pure unmistakable sound of Air at their best, often imitated, never bettered. Unfortunately, Baricco reads all over it. Tellingly, the highlight is when Baricco closes the book and remains silent, freeing up the space for Nicolas Godin and Jean Benoit Dunckel to chip in ‘Musica’.
If you are a Baricco reader and have fluent or good Italian, then I’m sure this a wonderful companion piece to his books. If it’s Air you’re after, stick to their back cat.