We've had an insurgence of bands hailing from Japan lately, and I can't entirely say that's a bad thing. Japanese bands tend to lend themselves easily to the idiosyncratic and often utterly foreign sounds of electronic music. Boom Boom Satellites are just such a band that has nestled their way into a tiny niche of their own. Do they keep the flow going with Full of Elevating Pleasures?Well, not completely. Formed in Europe in 1997 and having already toured with such popular electronic acts such as Underworld in Europe and Moby in the United States, not to mention having played at least six major rock festivals in Europe and with songs showing up on the highly acclaimed Anime film Appleseed, Boom Boom Satellites have already garnered plenty of attention and loads of fans, and hardly have anything to prove. But in Elevating Pleasures the band pushes the boundaries of electronica-jolted rock (or is it rock-jolted electronica?) with a hackneyed gospel flare that Moby has already worn to a bloody pulp. It works for the most part however because it's not overused, but it's certainly nothing new.
Lead vocalist Nakano Masayuki (or is it Kawashima Michiyuki?) has a distinctive vocal delivery that thankfully doesn't drown in the feedback and head-pounding drum beats. Most of these tracks are some form of pure rock n' roll mixed with subtle and devious electronic programming that is all their own, but there are moments when you hear a vocal track or drum beat/loop that you swear you just downloaded and screwed with in Fruity Loops, which cheapens the production a wee bit. Also, about halfway through this album you get the feeling that the band kind of ran out of ideas and just started regurgitating beats and sounds and vocals to form a messy cowboy stew of sorts to fill the album with. Disappointing, considering how strong the album started, especially with "Let It All Come Down", which sounds like a future single.
As a whole the album holds together fairly well and in the end can be a unique addition to one's electronic library, but certain tracks completely fall apart on there own and shouldn't be orphaned from the rest of the record. Standout tracks include the aforementioned "Let It All Come Down", "Back in the Night", and single "Dive For You".
