CODE INDIGO: Take the Money & Run (2014)
Updated: Jul 13, 2020
“This is a splendid album which ends one of the very beautiful stories of the contemporary England EM scene; the one of Code Indigo”
1 Eden to Corruption 10:36
2 Call of the Earth (Ambient) 6:00
3 Return to Gaia 7:30
4 Ashes and Snow 14:27
5 A Question of Answers 11:39
6 Memory Code I 6:12
7 Memory Code II 8:25
8 Memory Code III 2:03
9 Memory Code IV 9:00
10 Memory Code V 2:52
11 Memory Code VI 5:30
(CD/DDL 78:55) (V.F.)
(Progressive, melodic e-rock)
It's over! TAKE THE MONEY & RUN is the swan song of one of the rare groups of musicians who mix deliciously their EM in the harmonious caresses of New Age, in the dreamlike structures of the English progressive music and in the heavy and devastating rhythms of the England School style. It's a delicious mix which has seduced thousands of ears since the very first Code Indigo album released in 1996; For Whom the Bell. More than 15 years later and 9 albums farther, Code Indigo loops the loop with a last album which makes a last lap of honour and revisits some of the big works of a committed band whose very esthetic music always denounced the excesses and injustices of our modern world. Behind a concept approach very near Meltdown, David Wright and Nigel Turner-Heffer have revisited and retouched some of the big tracks from the Code Indigo catalog. Music pieces lost in compilations (E-Day 2010), in sessions (Meltdown) and remixes of tracks which became immortal of the England band.
A line of sequences, full of keys which gurgle in the noises of machineries, goes round in circles, and looks for its rhythmic aim in the reflections of synth streaks with a metallic squeaks. Like a dance of lost steps walking round and round in a disused factory, Eden to Corruption leads us into the Code Indigo's universe of thousand paradoxes. Between a heavy and aggressive rhythm, suave and ethereal harmonies, and ambiences at both Berber and contemplative; the music of Code Indigo travels through its very personal colors. Those who are familiar with the band will recognize Eden to Chaos from TimeCode, as well as Eden to Chaos (Corrupted Time Mix) which appeared on the E-Day's special CD from the Dutch label Groove. In fact, Eden to Corruption is a delicious remix of both tracks which are melted together in a new sonic envelope. The rhythm is circular. It swirls heavily with a line of bass sequences which leans on good strikings of electronic percussions. Heavy and spheroidal, it embroiders a fine stroboscopic line to which Andy Lobban's aggressive guitar nibbles with ferocity while keeping a little of energy for very musical solos and more ethereal strata. We stamp of the feet on a very lively rhythm which goes and comes, as we meditate on the very sensual groans of Louise Eggerton and the very nostalgic passages from the pianos of David Wright and Robet Fox who exchange their dreamy melodies for Andy Lobban's very penetrating guitar bites. We are on familiar ground and especially comfortable with this remix which introduces marvellously the next 60 minutes of this album.
Call of the Earth (Ambient Mix), always out of TimeCode, is unrecognizable. This ambient bewitching lullaby, of which the soft rhythmic swarm lays on fine tribal percussions, is restructured around the very seraphic voice of Louise Eggerton while the synth lines with whistle for dreamers is replaced by a magnificent piano and its very melancholic melody. This is great and more contemporary. We still remain in the oneiric realm with the wonderful Return to Gaia; a new version of Gaia that we found on this E-Day 2010. Between Pink Floyd and Moody Blues, Return to Gaia offers a delicate rhythm, almost oriental tribal, with fine percussions which weave a mesmerizing ethereal dance on which Andy Lobban's guitar floats and scatters solos in the tears of a piano and of its clandestine harmonies. The arrangements are of a seraphic neatness to make melt concrete. Without being aware of it, we have just passed throughout 25 minutes of pure magic when Ashes and Snow falls in our ears like an unexpected present. Written during the Meltdown sessions, it offers a slow rhythm with fine synth pads of which the fluty aromas are mixing up in our ears with the very ethereal voice of Carys. A little like in Meltdown, a male voice roams all over a structure and its evolution which goes alongside of Eden to Corruption. The slow rhythm part dives into a kind of jerky progressive rock à la Pink Floyd where Dave Bareford's guitar does all the work of seduction. A Question of Answers