Album Review: Homesongs by Adem

While Kieran Hebden of Fridge is busy dressing up his folk-electronica in tasteful jazz as Four Tet, his fellow band member, Adem Ilhan, has decided to go naked. Abandoning the instrumentals and concepts, stripping away his surname and his bass lines, Ilhan has found his voice and exposed his soul for this debut. Rather than tinkering with tradition, he expands upon it with computer-generated hums and bleeps, tambourines and glockenspiel, warming the stark acoustic sound.

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Who knew that beating within the chest of Adem Illhan, bass player for the British post-rock trio Fridge, was the heart of a lovelorn English troubadour. On his mesmerizing debut, Homesongs, Adem offers up ten lessons in how home recording doesn't have to sound like crap for it to be cool. The artist wrote, performed, and produced the record with an ear for sonic detail and an obvious love for the fireplace warmth of a closely recorded acoustic guitar, making even the most challenging tracks accessible.

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Adem Ilhan may be one-third of Fridge, but you certainly wouldn’t know it from listening to Homesongs. Wandering far from the sounds of his famed trio and bandmate Kieran Hebden’s solo material, Adem explores an entirely different musical path on his solo debut. Essentially, Homesongs is a folk record, built on solid foundation of strummed acoustic guitar and plaintive romantic lyrics, along with the occasional flourish of flutes and uilleann pipes.

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