Lollo Rosso

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Remix album projects abound these days, it would seem, but I would venture that not many top the High Llamas remix album in terms of consistent quality. That in itself no doubt has much to do with the album having, as it were, a real reason to exist. The High Llamas, for all their much talked-about Beach Boys fixation and general obsession with quirky songwriting have nonetheless been edging further towards the fringes of electronica of late, particularly on their most recent long-playing outing Cold and Bouncy. Lollo Rosso makes the move blatant. Llamas main-man Sean O'Hagan has commissioned six remixes from some of the most innovative pop experimentalists around - confirming, if nothing else, his spot-on taste and ear for the original. Mouse On Mars turn in their usual pristine, beautiful subversive pop; Japanese producer-genius Cornelius goes all funky. Elsewhere Germany's Schneider TM, Kid Loco, Chicago producer-guitarist-composer Jim O'Rourke and Manchester's warped cut-up merchants Stock, Hausen and Walkman all do their stuff with the Llamas' left-field take on the art of the song. Pretty damned wonderful, really.