Le Café Abstrait Volume 3

Being a music journalist always used to entail a lot of freebies and bonuses. The Sex Pistols, for example, used to send out plastic vomit and wraps of speed to their journo and press contacts.

Somewhere in the last 25 years though, we’ve mellowed… and this CD came packaged with… drumroll please… a specially printed sachet containing one (count ‘em) bag of wholesome green tea. Green tea. I mean… ggghhh. This planet.

The history bit is that Raplaël Marionneau established and ran a quality chillout night called Le Cafe Abstrait based at Hamburg’s Mojo club. Sadly the club is being demolished to make way for trendy office blocks, and it’s with this half-sadness, half-what’s-the-world-coming-to spirit that Marionneau lays down this smooth mix of very ambient ambient (if you see what I mean.)

The music here is alright, there’s good emotional bits, and the production is first-class. However we can do without dodgy poetry (Gare Du Nord’s Poem Rouge), hotel house band Clavi workouts (Keller & Schönwälder’s Ambient Tales) and sub-Lamb ethno-hop ballads (Bliss’ Kissing.)

As an album though it’s too sensitive, too wishy-washy, and while it would be the perfect accompaniment to a friendless afternoon sat indoors while the sun blazes down outside, at the end of the day you want to tell it to pull itself together, go and meet some new people, and stop being so miserable all the time.