CocoRosie The Adventures Of Ghosthorse And Stillborn by: Al Cottrill Tue:12-Jun-07 Label: Touch and Go Year: 2007 WB rating 83 out of 100

It is hard to doubt that these two sisters are genuine weirdos, an odd couple, half-Cherokees channelling the displacement and spiritualism of a childhood spent travelling with their shaman/teacher father. From their gender-bending performances to their unique vocals they are undoubtedly one of the most divisive music acts around. Their third LP, The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn has enough eccentricities to warrant a continuation of this title, but if you take a second to look beyond the obvious whimsy, you will find an album that overflows with melody and autobiographical content, a combination of Coco and Rosie’s dislocated childhood with a dream-like fairytale. It is a re-telling of half-forgotten imaginations and adventures: made-up friends, a mother’s love, a father’s power and a ‘dead’ brother. It is also their most cogent record yet, as the duo have grown and matured between releases, refining their eclectic sound. The promised talent shown in La Maison De Mon Rêve was proven in the eponymous ‘Noah’s Ark’ and others. It has been further refined in The Adventures of Ghosthorse and Stillborn, with airy embellishments toned down and a concentration on fully realised songs rather than interesting compositions.

The Adventure of Ghosthorse and Stillborn is certainly a more fully realised construction than their previous works. There is a theme here, a narrated, oblique story of adventures and childhood, not to mention significant catharsis and autobiography. Importantly it does not sound hackneyed or contrived. While the lyrics are esoteric at best, bordering on recondite reconstructions of childhood memories, like a child explaining a half-forgotten dream, the music clearly has its roots in hip-hop. Despite this, there is no point trying to categorise their sound, as they have evolved beyond the initial freak-folk comparisons that nearly fitted their previous work. Progression is far from the right word too, as CocoRosie’s sound is anachronistic at best, combining childhood instrumentation and ambient debris to create an ethereal collage from another time. Despite the organic base, it is music nonetheless, but with crackling gramophone fuzz pervading a child’s memoirs from late-19th century France.

The hip-hop aesthetic is no more evident than in ‘Rainbowarriors’, its bumping drum machine backbeat providing a simple base over which Bianca (Coco) can rap. As with much of CocoRosie’s work, it combines both sister’s key competencies, with Sierra (Rosie) distinct soprano introducing the song, and breaking the verses in between. However, it’s more than such simple pleasures that lift this song’s emotion. There is an intangible happiness somehow conveyed within, tracking Bianca’s lyrics and drawn out in the ambient and organic sounds of birds whistling, bike bells ringing and children’s toys buzzing. They wind it back with ‘Promise’, which shadows Adventures with a portent trip-hop beat and a naïve, rough-diamond hope in its sexual innuendo: “And the heart is dumb and the heart is blind/But I think you'll find that the lord is kind/And I pray you'll cherish this tarnished offering/Burnt silver brushed lavender offspring”. They are two of CocoRosie’s best compositions, and display the rewards of controlled eccentricity.

While the abstract nature and strange tools may prevent CocoRosie from ever becoming mainstream fodder, Adventures is a pop album. Don’t be put off by the impenetrable prose and unconventional sounds pouring from this album, because for the most part, it is simply the same music heard every day, through brought about through a different journey. Delving past the superficiality of airy embellishments such as bike bells and birdcalls, there is almost always a melody underneath that is the equal of most million-dollar pop. Even if it is not front-and-centre in the song, it is the reason a song like ‘Sunshine’ can exist on just a voice and single, separate notes of piano.
Although preferring to avoid a full track-by-track analysis, it is impossible not to mention ‘Werewolf’. One of the year’s highlights, it contains enough emotion on its own to carry the album. Full of cryptic misgivings about a father and a partner, Bianca’s rap instils the song with power and sadness: “He’s a black magic wielder some say a witch/Wielded darkness when he was wilein’ on his mom’s unborn child/And he was the bastard that broke up the marriage/Evil doer doing evil from a baby carriage”, while Sierra exhorts defiance: “I’m a shake you off though/Get up on that horse and/Ride into the sunset/Look back with no remorse”. It is CocoRosie’s best work yet.

Swaying from a broken-music box melody in Animal to a delicate Edith Piaf swing in Sunshine, this focus yields great results. Not surprisingly though, the music’s inherent variability results in as many near misses as beautiful hits. ‘Black Poppies’ just survives its evening tempo, intermissions ‘Bloody Twins’ and ‘Girl and the Geese’ tend towards immaturity rather than interesting narration, and ‘Miracle’s minimalism erodes it beyond purpose. Japan is the low-point, a cringing immature jaunt, it contains everything CocoRosie’s fragile sound threatens to collapse into when mishandled. Almost a self-parody, its dancehall/burlesque show-tune and puerile lyrics misconstrue CocoRosie’s attraction, dismissing the gentle complexity and arcane spirituality of their better works in favour of garish immaturity and jaunting pomp.

The only reason the lesser songs come across as weak is they are a slighted by the brightness of the highlights. Despite an even spread between true peaks and weaker compositions, the better songs are some of the most delicate, haunting and euphoric of the year, while the others are simply minor lulls in this memorable set. CocoRosie have promised much before, and there is true progression here, with a refinement of their style and song structure, and stronger delineation between the respective sister’s roles. But it takes more than just a few hip-hop beats to throw of the shackles of such a distinctive sound. Nonetheless, with such beautiful pop, who knows, it may even be enough to open the door for the masses into their eccentric world.