I’ve spent the morning listening to Telefon Tel Aviv after learning yesterday of the passing of TTA member Charlie Cooper. The electronica duo spent most of their professional life based in Chicago, but Cooper and Joshua Eustis met in New Orleans as underage music fans hanging around the Abstract Cafe, the RC Bridge Lounge and Monaco Bob’s in the early 1990s. They were as well versed in punk as bounce, and when they needed strings for their second album, 2004’s Map of What is Effortless, they composed the parts and took them to the Loyola University Chamber Orchestra, which played them. 

I haven’t had time to come to grips with their new album, Immolate Yourself, though on first listen, it’s a significant departure from the lush maximalism that has characterized their work to date. Their debut, Fahrenheit Far Enough (2001) is slightly dated by the buzz and clicks of laptop electronica that has passed out of vogue, but their sense of melody is subtly complex with a lot of warmth to balance the cool, metallic surface textures that create energy and movement.

On Map of What is Effortless, their affection for dance music is more pronounced, particularly on the Prince-like, skittering “My Week Beats Your Year.” Again, the tension between warmth and cool plays out on the album, with Lindsay Anderson’s club diva deadpanning the lyrics after Damon Aaron’s nakedly confessional “I Lied.” His vocals now bring Phil Collins to mind, but not in a bad way, and throughout the album, the vocals chase the clicks and surface noise to the background, as if they served the lead vocal function. And while you can hear their techno background, the title track is lush and glacial, flirting with ambience in its lack of percussive elements and obvious movement.

On 2007’s Remixes Compiled, some of the tracks are easily dated. Their remix of Nine Inch Nails’ “Even Deeper” is obviously working with the sonic tools and sensibilities evident on Fahrenheit Far Enough, while Bebel Gilberto is integrated into the band as if she were one of the cast of singers for Map of What is Effortless on their remix of her “All Around.” The highlight of the album and its most controversial track is the extreme remix of Oliver Nelson’s “Stolen Moments” for a Blue Note remix album. Nelson’s track is barely in evidence, as if its role in the remix was to inspire this string-heavy track led by melancholy violins with dub-influenced guitars and subtle whooshes and whirrs massing on the margins of the track.

Beyond their ability to process sounds until they seem to morph from one instrument into another, melancholy is a common thread in Telefon Tel Aviv’s music so much so that it’s almost a third member of the group. It’s less obvious on Immolate Yourself in my first listens, but it’s not gone completely. At this point in the listening experience, the album seems like a conscious attempt to scale down and let electronic instruments sound electronic – perhaps to be as much a part of new new wave moment as they can muster.

I wouldn’t pretend to be someone who really knows them. I’ve interviewed Josh twice and when I was at Gambit, I went to lunch with Josh, Charlie and Damon around the time Map was released. None of that musical melancholy was present that afternoon as they were excited to be in the South again and happy to be back in the land of real food. And I wish I had something smart to say to wrap this up, but I really don’t. I just find this sad.