Wiki
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Release Date
21 September 2007
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Length
12 tracks
Chapter 1
Reykjavík, Kuala Lumpur, Darmstadt, London or maybe it’s Sevilla tonight? Whatever metropolis TNT Jackson happen to find themselves in, excitement can’t be far. Surpassing musical conventions with a flick of their wrists, these three Austrian musicians now present their genre-defying sophomore album, “Across The Towers“. Following the critical acclaim of their 2005 debut, “Lovers“, the boys took their time and found a new, more organic focus for their second release. If “Lovers“ was the album you listened to before going out on a Friday night, “Across The Towers“ is the album you want to listen to on the taxi ride home.
Surrounded by an air of mystery, TNT Jackson never divulge their true identities, and instead go simply by T, N, and T. With an ever-changing band biography (legend has it they found friendship in a near-fatal plane crash over Estonia) and a penchant for matching uniforms, TNT Jackson marry boyish charm with a genuine air of coolness. “Across The Towers“ is an album of and for the heart, centered on longing and reflection. Thematically coursing through these tracks, from the spellbinding instrumental opener “Lamarr“, to the heartbreaker “Ours Is Forever“, is a realization that things are only beautiful because they are fleeting.
“We admit that we were and still are dilettantes“, the band says when asked about their musical approach. With nods to dance music, psychedelic krautpop and post-funk, TNT Jackson haven taken their music to a deeper level. While recording, the tape was left to simply run on, allowing the band a more dreamy and fluid approach. Despite the maturity of “Across The Towers“, humor and fun are never far where TNT Jackson are concerned. The first single, “All Black“, playfully references their debut album and on the hard-partying “Pushit“, Art Brut frontman Eddie Argos gives a shout-out to Salt‘N‘Pepa’s ‘90s hit as he finds himself in dire straits, without cigarettes, at a festival in the south of Europe.
The most ambitious and refined work of their careers yet, “Across The Towers“ is a love letter to the city. Whatever city you find yourself listening to this album in, TNT Jackson’s music expresses the feelings of longing, excitement, and hope that unite us all, across the towers. As the band says: “It’s important to us that anything’s possible.“
by Barbara Matthews
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Chapter 2
In its harmonic, song-based language „Across The Towers“ remains an album on which, even more so than on their debut, the experiment is the starting point for a musical search for direction. This is why the tracks on the album emerged over long stretches in jam sessions, which saw TNT Jackson retreat to the seclusion of the Cselley Mühle in Oslip. Surrounded by heaps of analogue synthesisers, echo pedals and guitar stuff, deliberately noisy recording tracks emerged and tracks that accidentally captured the atmosphere of the courtyard, which TNT Jackson included into their songwriting without any effect snatching. Such snippets that come up at times between the lines as doors creaking, snoring or cats miaowing, combined with passionate first-take aesthetics, make „Across The Towers“ a record that still flirts with the genre synth-pop while not getting absorbed by it.
The aspect of the hedonistic triangle of party-club-city that was manifest on their debut album began to falter as well. The latter, the city, remains, as the title suggests, it is still a theme, however urbanity is not only dealt with from a distance and in the lyrics. The retreat to the rural confines of the Burgenland was also important for that: “It was good to have some peace and quiet. Besides, we thought if Eno and Cluster drew so much musical inspiration from the seclusion and their roles as self-supporters then we’d like to try that as well.”
However, this aspect also brought about that, as opposed to “Lovers”, there are hardly any collaborations on the new album. Apart from Eddie Argos, who paid a visit to the boys during the recording sessions, only the kitty Knef and band-companion Oliver Stotz (recording, production) were always present.
Back in Vienna, the raw takes were handed on to another confidant, Wolfgang Schlögl, whose work as a Sofa Surfer and I-Wolf the TNT-boys have admired for a long time. He carefully dealt with production, details and mixing. If it was up to him, the album would be called “Into the Sun”, inspired by the circles seen on the cover artwork. These were taken from a ‘50s sci-fi novel-book that T had found in a friend’s basement, loved and scanned. Moreover, taken with the contentual quality of the stories, he lent it to his band mates and accidentally one favourite story of all three emerged. It is the story of an overwhelming future-city in which closeness and affection between two people can only be expressed by means of temporary distance. The name of this short story: Across The Towers.
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