Tiga
Ciao!
Release Date: May 26, 2009
Genre(s): Electronic
Record label: Last Gang
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Album Review: Ciao! by Tiga
Great, Based on 7 Critics
Based on rating 9.0/10
Montreal’s Tiga seems best known here for his DJ skills and stellar remixes, but Ciao! is actually his second studio album. For some reason the U.S. mostly slept on 2006’s Sexor, even in spite of its tracks like “You Gonna Want Me” and “Good as Gold” becoming classic dance tunes. Like his debut, Ciao! is worth noting: His second effort may just be the best dance full-length of the year.
Based on rating 9/10
In the wryly cheeky interview video "Ciao! Means Forever," created to correspond with the release of his second artist album, the preposterously pseudo-pompous Tiga Sontag affects a perfectly deadpan disdain to describe his aversion to touching musical instruments, explaining how he's "forced to use his voice" as his only means of musical expression. The impish Montrealer is in fact credited with co-production on each of Ciao!'s tracks (and, in one case, 808 "live programming," whatever that means) which probably gives the lie to that particular bit of eccentric-artiste whimsy, but in any case, he's enlisted some highly qualified operators to handle much of the menial knob-twiddling here, mostly longtime collaborators and friends who just happen to include several leading lights of 2000s electro-house: the Belgian Dewaele brothers (better known as Soulwax and/or 2 Many DJs), Finnish producer Jori Hulkkonen (aka Zyntherius), Sweden's Jesper Dahlbäck, fellow Canadian Jason "Gonzales" Beck, and James Murphy of DFA and LCD Soundsystem renown. Tiga acknowledges their contributions in the liners with his allegedly well-known "false humility," admitting that without them he'd be "just another extremely funny guy who is amazing at football" -- but in all seriousness their generous and readily discernible input helps to make Ciao! one of the most assured and enjoyable electronic pop/dance albums, front to back, in recent memory.
Based on rating 4/5
On Tiga's second record, you can tell the Montreal producer is torn between a desire to make the kind of club tracks he's banged out since teenhood and what he often refers to as "real music" - organically written tunes that could earn him the respect and fame he craves. [rssbreak] Ciao! successfully balances both. His push toward "real" songwriting is aided significantly by Canadian expat and multi-instrumentalist Jason "Gonzales" Beck, who spins a Parisian pop spell on the track Luxury and grounds Tiga's high-camp inclinations on Shoes.
Based on rating 7.4/10
Montreal DJ/producer Tiga doesn't seem particularly interested in the single-single-comp-album-remix-etc. battle plan of your average electronic artist/producer. Sexor, released in 2006, was his first proper album after seven years of DJ mixes and intermittently brilliant cover tracks. Ciao! once again features Soulwax and Jesper Dahlback on production duties, but it adds James Murphy and Jason "Gonzales" Beck to the mix, resulting in a more varied album that rarely requires Tiga's (improving) sing/talk voice to carry too much weight.
Based on rating 6/10
Tiga is high fashion. To listen to Tiga’s latest album Ciao! is to know you’re hearing something very current, very “now”, and you just know you’re hearing something that someone is going to recommend to all of their “in-the-know” friends. To hear Tiga is to hear car commercials, but not just any car commericals; Tiga is custom made for Lexus, or Mercedes-Benz, or Jaguar.
Based on rating 3/5
For all its futuristic intent, electro-pop is actually rooted in the past. Montreal 's Tiga Sontag has always nodded to the genre's 80s origins but keeps it fresh by drawing from rave past and present. On this bleepy, banging, glamour-chasing follow-up to 2006's Sexor, he is working with Soulwax and fellow CanadianGonzales. Fun times.
Based on rating 3/5
For all its futuristic intent, electro-pop is actually rooted in the past. Montreal 's Tiga Sontag has always nodded to the genre's 80s origins but keeps it fresh by drawing from rave past and present. On this bleepy, banging, glamour-chasing follow-up to 2006's Sexor, he is working with Soulwax and fellow CanadianGonzales. Fun times.