Dots and Loops

Stereolab’s fifth full-length album proper can be a bit divisive — it’s certainly a significant shift in direction from their previous albums, and there are aspects of it that some listeners might find a little too tidy and clean, if you’re not in the right mood. But listening back, it feels like the album where Stereolab let go of some of the influences that informed their music up to its time — Neu!, the Velvets, the Modern Lovers — and mapped out a different set of coordinates for their music. Some of this is doubtless due to recording with members of Tortoise and Mouse On Mars, who give the album a jazzier swing and a more insectile approach to electronics and texture, respectively. There are many pleasures to be had here, from the warped junglisms of “Parsec” to the four-part “Refractions in the Plastic Pulse,” which somehow manages to reconcile bossa nova, cosmic electronics and Morricone-esque strings.