POP Will Eat Itself. The best thing about the band of that name was the name. Ten years after they called it a day, the phrase has become the quickest, laziest way to describe how music endlessly mutates. You hear it more often today than when it directly referred to PWEI.
|
| |
|
How are you on new rave? Yes, it exists - the NME tells us so. Like they told us Madchester is where it was at in the early 90's and shoegazing was going to save all students from impeding celibacy. Grooves which are a little bit dumb, and clever enough to know it; are a little bit guitary and a little bit dancey, are big again. And just the other day San Diego's The Rapture woke up to find they'd been anointed godfathers of the new (or neu, or nu?!) wave movement. As the psychedelic waves of crazy crazes come and go in popular culture or the darker more underground sub cultures, certain ideas plant themselves and evolve with increasing deadly speed .One of these at the moment seems to be the new style of indie music, as its ever looming presence engulfs all in its path, including a hefty slice of old school dance music.
|
| |
|
At the forefront of this quite seemingly random mixture of old and new, guitars and glow sticks, prances The Klaxons who describe themselves as screamo happy hardcore pop. Now if that isn’t the most contradicting genre I’ve ever heard then call me emo. Although this glamorous combination might scare the more emotionally in tune of us away, I do think there is a glimmer of hope here for the unifying opportunities of cross dressing genres. |
| |
|
|
|
|
The Klaxons |
Shitdisco |
New Young Pony Club |
|
| |
|
The Klaxons perform as an early 90’s rave tribute, recreating old school acid house rave acts such as Altern-8 and Baby D and more modern techno labels like Cluster Records. Listening to ‘Gravity’s Rainbow’ they sound like all the other indie bands to me, but with more euphoric lyrics – not that that is a bad thing. But then what was I expecting, today you have to sound like NMEs lapdogs to get anywhere. ‘Atlantis to Interzone’ uses some more trance and acid house style sounds, and I think it works well with the punky vocals over the panic sirens. |
| |
Scotland’s Shitdisco are another act hoping to catch the wave before it crashes, and I think they sound nearer to what Neu-Rave suggests. You can hear the influence of Prodigy in their snappy drumming and grimy breakdowns, and this works with the stoner rock-esque voice of the singer of Joe Reeves in ‘Disco Blood’. But they still sound more old school New York punk than British rave.
|
| |
|
New Young Pony Club are another outfit ready and willing to provide you with filthy electro grunge food stuffs, but who are they playing for?
Would other 30 year old ex-ravers listen to these bands just because they mention old acid house tunes and lyrics and are influenced by early rave? If it’s to really take off a huge fanbase is needed. Luckily these guys have already discovered MySpace and are using it to their full advantage in getting enough contacts to start touring with the right bands and advertising to the open minded new generations of hedonistic guitar lovers.
So is it time for the moaning eighties come backs to retire and the early nineties electronic revival to really bloom?
Only circular time and the short term memory of youth will tell. |
|
