It’s about the bass and the drums. The choirboy high vocals and sugary melodies catch the ear first, but they’d be so much soufflé without the room-shaking, stomach-wobbling bass throb, the Chic-style disco drumming and its tsk-tsk-tsk hi-hat shuffle. Combined, the soft and airy, the propulsive and grounded make the audience move. Not tap a toe, but actually move – dance.
About a year ago, when I saw Gorillaz’ sensational show at the O2 Arena in London, one of the highlights of the evening was “To Binge”, the duet between Damon Albarn and Yukimi Nagano, the Swedish-Japanese singer with the Swedish band Little Dragon. It was a fabulous moment - a song drenched in emotion, Albarn on his knees, Nagano’s voice swooping and soaring.
Scratch Massive sound from their name as if they should be a very dodgy hip-hop outfit. They are not. Instead, French duo Maud Geffray and Sebastien Chenaut are a music-based art unit who have worked on sonic projects with Karl Lagerfeld, soundtracked films for Zoe Cassavettes and were once produced by German techno DJ-producer Moritz von Oswald. Their first album, back in 2003, dabbled in hefty rock dynamics but somewhere along the way – possibly that Moritz von Oswald connection - they were persuaded of the power of synthesisers.
“Molly had a red shirt/ Susie, she ripped her shirt off completely/ Danny poured the beer all over Sally/ We all ran around the back yard/ It was crazy clown time/ It was real fun”. The voice is strangled, high. A treated guitar phases in and out, puncturing moaning sounds. A simple beat thuds. David Lynch’s fun might not be yours or mine, but his new album packs a punch. Crazy Clown Time is nightmarish. Seductive, too.
Gary Numan and Cliff Richard are clearly kindred spirits. One was born Gary Webb, the other Harry Webb. Both have strangely youthful appearances, though one owes it to tennis while the other looks as if he owes it to the blood of virgins. Both are deeply unfashionable yet have fiercely loyal fan bases. And a quick fact check reveals that Numan's "Cars" replaced Cliff's "We Don't Talk Any More" at Number One 32 years ago last month.
The Lexington on Pentonville Road is a pub with an easy-going Deep South style. The main bar looks like the sort of place where cattle barons might relax with basque-clad floozies after a hard week kicking homesteaders off their land. Instead, however, the place has a smattering of people, mostly in their twenties, a number with large sideburns and Stooges T-shirts, listening to a New Zealander called Delaney Davidson playing solo blues.
The 14th album from Vince Clarke and Andy Bell is supposed to herald a change, or so we are told by their people. Have they gone Goth? Have they discovered dubstep? Like heck. The only thing that has changed appears to be Andy Bell's eerily robotic face. Don't be fooled by the title. There is nothing futuristic about the nine songs here. There isn't even a cameo on backing vocals from Raymond Baxter, the presenter of the BBC series that got to their title first.
As Gary Numan strode out onto the stage last night, for the Shepherd's Bush leg of his Dead Son Rising tour, his black boots a-shining, his arms a-waving, his proto-emo knees a-bending, well, you couldn't say the crowd went insane, exactly - but they were very pleased to see him.
Many people think Kasabian are some sort of sub-Oasis lads' band. This is mostly down to gobby lead singer Tom Meighan. Also Q like them which doesn't help - they're on the magazine's current cover being cuddled by two naked ladies. The Leicester band don't fit the bill. Kasabian are no lame indie band, not that anyone is these days, now that it's terminally unhip. Kasabian, however, never were. One listen to their excellent eponymous 2004 debut album tells you that.
There’s a strand of electro-assisted, dance-leaning French pop that’s captured the international consciousness. Phoenix and Justice are Grammy winners, while Air exemplify the cooler, more reflective end of it. The bands come from chi-chi burbs like Versailles or towns south of Paris, south of the Seine. And so it is for Housse de Racket, an outfit from Chaville, between Versailles and Paris. On the evidence of their second album, they’re potential border breakers.