Caribou
Our Love
MERGE
8/10
A review of Caribou‘s Our Love will be dominated by the sheer brilliance of its opening track “Can’t Do Without You”—a sublime piece of low-end keyboard composition. It’s just four chords. They go ’round and ’round. They sound so good. The two and four beats are pushed so it grows like some heavenly rave. Can the rest of album match this level of quality? Well, yes. Our Love is a great album of beautifully realized down-tempo electro, which also kicks out a couple of ravers. “All I Ever Need” and “Our Love” softly plod amongst swirling atmospherics before the album drops into a rave, facilitated by an early ’90s vocal edit. “All I Ever Wanted” sits halfway between Plone and Aaliyah, an R&B–flecked slow jam to soundtrack some Williamsburg rooftop gathering. There’s so much greatness in this album, and for a record that is all about love in its many incarnations, it’s both impressively imaginative and innovative.
