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March 9, 2018 - Domino/Double Six Records
All That Must Be, George FitzGerald’s second full-length album, covers a lot of emotional ground from beginning to end, but it doesn’t require us as listeners to travel much from one song to the next. Instead, we sit suspended in refined, golden honey and observe the change taking place around us. Songs flow together effortlessly as part of one living landscape, and the listening experience becomes a sentimental, introspective journey. This dessert may be too syrupy for some, but for those of us with a sweet tooth, it’s just what we are craving.
George FitzGerald is a master at tapping into the feeling, the quality of music that renders it universal, within an inherently abstract musical genre. He taps in, then gets out of the way. His music is timeless—the emotions he explores are understood across boundaries of culture, time and space. And All That Must Be fits right into the progression of his oeuvre.
Most of the songs are either too soft for the club or only appropriate deep into the night when dancers are in a more sentimental mood. The notable exceptions are ‘Burns’ and ‘Siren Calls.’ ‘Burns’ is punchy with a drop of melancholy, an anthem we’ve all been dancing to for some time now—it’s been getting a ton of play out as a hit single leading up to this album. ‘Siren Calls’ builds and releases with an overblown bass that is definitely crafted for decks. But, FitzGerald still softens the siren and throws it back in space, rounding out the sound, adding warmth, and thus connecting his dance track to the rest of the album. Everything he touches, even something as cold as a techno cliché, is pretty, rotund and unmistakably his.
Building an album that includes multiple hits that also fit together is challenging for many electronic musicians, who often seem to work song-by-song, collecting a mass of hot, club-ready singles that are then thrown together on an album when it’s time to release something. These albums wind up sounding eclectic at best but are often disjointed and difficult to listen to from start to finish. George FitzGerald has avoided this issue by letting go of the pressure to focus on danceability, instead prioritizing the album as a unit on a singular plane, considering the songs together as one concept more than considering them apart. And while I think this is generally a strong approach, All That Must Be almost capitalizes too much on the concept of bittersweet and misses out on opportunities for more depth.
It is easy to pick out the collaborations without looking at the track titles. Since the signature scent of George FitzGerald’s sound is relatable emotional transparency, his work functions as an open stage, susceptible to the distinct flavors of other musicians. I enjoy the auditory variety the collaborations provide. However, George FitzGerald still commands the emotional space on the collaborative tracks, and they almost fit too well into the continuum of the album. Despite the power of the artists he’s chosen to work with—Lil Silva, Hudson Scott, Tracey Thorn, even Bonobo—the collaborators themselves still function as ephemeral spices sprinkled atop the soundscape. He almost breaks free of this dimension with ‘Nobody Like You’ and ‘Half-Light.’ But, overall, his devotion to the album All That Must Be limits the songs as individual pieces, and I do wish there were more of the collaborators showing.
Still, All That Must Be is a sweet tonic that is definitely worth ingesting and should be considered holistically as an appeal to the human soul. The bittersweetness of a self-aware existence is a musical subject we will never get enough of. And after 45 minutes of being enveloped in the shimmery, emotional space of this album, I feel the same resolution as I would after a good cry. ☔