WHERE THE CITY MEETS THE SKY: CHASING YESTERDAY

Despite all his bluster about real rock & roll, Noel Gallagher came of age in Manchester during the '80s -- of course he has affection for dance music, particularly acid house. Where the City Meets the Sky is the first album released under his name to truly capitalize on this element of his lineage, something that remains hidden in plain sight despite his singing lead on a Chemical Brothers single in 1996. Noel enlists several artists of his own vintage -- Andrew Weatherall, who helped sculpt Screamadelica, comes aboard, as does David Holmes -- but he also turns a chunk over to Beyond the Wizard's Sleeve and 3D, with Psychemagik and Toydrum doing a track a piece. Everybody toys with only a handful of songs -- "Ballad of the Mighty I," "In the Heat of the Moment," "Riverman," "The Right Stuff," "The Girl with the X-Ray Eyes" -- but this gives the remixes enough raw material to shape. Usually, the most attractive moments are the ones that graft a heavy beat onto the measured originals -- Weatherall's "In the Heat of the Moment," Psychemagik's "The Right Stuff," Toydrum's "In the Heat of the Moment" -- but the rest creates a nicely textured, hypnotic trance that's not only enjoyable, it reinforces how Gallagher is savvier than he sometimes seems. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine