Made Like Us

by Paper Tiger

"This is the first full length record I have ever made," Paper Tiger informs us in the liner notes, and I suppose he's correct, although at just under 40 minutes, I would have appreciated a fuller full length, although I'm quite happy with what we did get here.


The album starts with the appropriately named 'First Track', which is a standard piano-laced instrumental intro track.  This being a mostly instrumental album, it sets the tone for the whole project, which repeatedly returns to the same type of slightly spaced out, relaxed beat.

The second track introduces some chopped up vocals, which is another recurring motif.  On the seventh track, '5360', PT switches this up a little, by having a narrator - he sounds like a young British teenage boy - tell his story, although most of it is buried in the music and hard to hear; it reminds me a little of trying to listen to people talking on the subway while you're wearing headphones.

This is not a strictly instrumental album though.  'The Painters Arm' features singing by Maggie Morrison, and the song has a bit of an 80s pop feel to the hook.  It's good, but it is completely overshadowed two tracks later by 'Palace', which features the incomparable Dessa, in the first of her two appearances on this disk (the second is on 'And the Camera'.  Dessa is such a beautiful singer, and writes infinitely more thoughtful lyrics than most (check out her album!).

In all, this is a very successful full-length debut.  PT creates some lovely moods with this album, and ends with a terrific beat that I could listen to for another twenty minutes without complaining or getting bored.  It would have been nice to see a little more representation of the rest of the Doomtree crew, but I am happy with this as it is.