two many frames

Music of the Moment

The duo of Vanessa Vassar and Axel Heilhecker (collectively known as Phonoroid) started working together on songs after he wandered into a recording studio to help her work on a project. Later she spent five months touring the U.S., collecting stories and taking Polaroids. Afterwards the two went to the recording studios and 15 days later emerged with "Too Many Frames" (Allegro CLD 9196-2).

This is slice-of-life music, bare bones in sound, with Miss Vassar's little-girl voice by turns captivating and irritating. The lyrics have the rambling quality of a Jack Kerouac story, sometimes pretentious, sometimes odd, but nearly always intriguing. Vassar says she liked the idea of working as a minimalist, and Phonoroid certainly has achieved that goal in this odd but mostly listenable debut.