Comments:
Zero7 provided a perfect segue at the half-way mark of my poker game last Friday night, for the second half is when everything tends to become transcendental and the games almost incidental, for as track one states “time goes so slow” —as do for most of these righteously mellow tracks.

Whereas, the first track takes you there, the second has you sit, the third settles you into a lie, a preparatory prostration for either a luscious sin or some forsaken confession —this be the mood Zero7 puts you in.

A mix of vocal and instrumental tracks “simple things” is an almost flawless collection of chill-out melodious whispers which can transition you into a dead-dream song after an all-night long stream of illegal annihilation. Everyone of the four different vocalists are fresh and unique enough to give each of their songs a sound they can truly hold their own without incurring upon the harmony of the album as a whole.

The out-of-town trumpet on track nine was so alarmingly subtle, that I was almost afraid that i had been transported through a time-warp only to be duped into listening to Herb (a tokin’ reference) and his Tijuana Brass. Not to trash Alpert’s contribution to classic Americana, but I’m so used to hearing trumpets blast in most forms of music from salsa, big band and rancheras (mariachi) to swing and contemporary jazz, that the melancholy mood of this lead performance had me confused (but perhaps not as much as the reader of this review probably is by now).

As sublime and subliminal and minimal the entire effect of simple things is, there is an impressive array of instruments used throughout this album: guitar, bass, percussion, stings (esp. violin), trumpet, and even a flute on red-dust.

The last track, “Spinning,” provides the perfect exit to simple things with Sophie Barker’s hypnotic voice asking us:
“Was it loneliness that brought you here? tired and weak...
Was it tiredness that made you sleep? have you lost your will to speak?”
No, Sopie, I think it was something else that induced my somnolence...