OMD's History of Modern album was one of my favourites of last year, a real masterclass in how to do synthpop well. After all, as one of the chief innovators of the sound back in the early 80s, you'd expect them to know a thing or two about it.
The band are now set to release a live CD of the album's accompanying tour, recorded at The Tempodrome in Berlin on the 18th November.
As a special limited collectors edition, the CD also comes with an exclusive embossed book featuring photos and lyrics. It all sounds very glossy and fabulous indeed! As does this brilliant taster track from the album, a live version of the band's most recent single: History of Modern (Part 1).
The History of Modern Tour - Live In Berlin CD is released on the 8th August and can be pre-ordered here.
Kites represent something rather exciting. Basking in the wake of a considerable wealth of press coverage from the likes of The Sunday Mirror and Time Out as well as having a support slot lined up with legend Peter Hook at Scala, the future looks bright for them. They even have a cool, flashy website.
Think of them as a mix of early New Order and OMD, especially on their track You Are (Dead To Me). With distinctive vocals, swirling synth hooks and lyrics full of wit, their songs chug along as if carefully cut and pasted together in a dimly lit factory; they're full of vigor and the rough-worn edges of labour. There's a real sense of artisanship to them.
Meanwhile, Take The Reins centres around bleepy electronics and low rumbling strings. As the guitar comes in a wintery beauty sweeps over the track, twinkling like stars in the dead of night. Here we have a sensitive ballad of the kind that so many bands try to pen, only to fail. This however sounds genuine and oh so fragile, a delicate sculpture of icy wonder.
It is on The Ddisappearance Of Becky Sharpe that they are at their strongest though, coming across half White Lies and half trippy acid house synths that could have comes straight out of The Beloved's Sweet Harmony. It's a meeting of three decades of British music in one glorious melting pot. As the synths swell up in the chorus and then again in the last minute of the song you get the sense of crashing waves of sound, raw and untamed - and that's the real strength of Kites; they're unpredictable, loose, innovative.
Just when you think you've got a handle on their tracks, some new element works its way in to the mix. In this respect, it could seem easy for them to lose their way, for everything to fall apart into its constituent elements. But it never does, the tracks stand tall and proud, gleaming constructs of skillful songwriting.
The Kites' previous single The Seamstress is also available to download from iTunes.
Metronomy's The English Riviera seems to be swiftly becoming one of those 'buzz' albums that everyone is talking about as newspapers and blogs around the country sing its praises. But in this instance, that praise is entirely justified.
Take single The Look for example, with its New Order-esque basslines. It's full of trippy, retro synthesizer riffs that could be straight out of Blade Runner soundtrack. Meanwhile, Corinne is like early Depeche Mode or OMD - a Just Can't Get Enough for the 21st century. There's even some funky Spandau Ballet guitar in there too. From start to end this album reads like a kind of 80s who's who compendium of influences; the trademark elements of so many bands melded into a sound that is carefree, joyous and almost childlike.
The real skill of Metronomy though comes in the fact that throughout all these touchstones of influence, it is always the band's own sound that remains most prevalent. Every song comes under their own distinct stamp. Within that individual stamp comes a tranquility, a funky vibe conjured up from rubbery basslines like those on laid-back We Broke Free. As the track slowly slides along, flowing and wave-like, guitar is worked in subtly - becoming part of the track instead of distracting from it.
The overall tropical summer feel that surrounds the whole album is at its strongest on Everything Goes My Way, with added female vocals mixing things up a bit. She Wants has more of the feel of a Duran Duran album track - a rustling, clicky beat driving a sense of low menace while guitar lines stab away.
Standing opposed to this, Trouble has the delicate kind of guitar work that made the Foals' Total Life Forever such a critical darling. Working in jazzy influences too the sunshine is almost palpable here. Indeed, the Foals album is the closest comparison to The English Riviera - there's a similar vision in the kind of world the band is attempting to create, and with so many different layers of sound going on here, it's a vastly involving world.
It's on tracks like The Bay where the album achieves what it sets out to do best - funky basslines and quirky lyrics reaching a crescendo in high powered choruses that fade away to twitching, minimal verses. There's a restless energy here, that feeling of when you've had a couple of beers and have that irresistible urge to dance. And it's important not to forget that on many levels this is fundamentally a dance album. Maybe not in the traditional sense of what that entials, but the music is most definitely danceable - and seeing it in that aspect gives it a whole extra dimension.
Loving Arm is full of Doctor Who-esque swirling synthesizers that sound so retro they're practically prehistoric - the track is full of primeval charm, as if it's some kind of fossil dug up on the shores of a windswept beach. Here, as with so much of the album, the band strikes the perfect equilibrium between indie, pop and dance. That sense of menace returns, but it's a menace that goes hand in hand with a bewitching beauty. It's like the old fairy tales, the danger that you can't help but fall for.
Joe Mount's vocals seem at complete ease throughout the album; he feels comfortable in his own skin, utterly confident in the message and sound he wants to convey. That's what The English Riviera is all about, a fantasy land existing exactly to his specifications; a fantasy land that for a while, we are invited into too.
It's not often a music video really knocks you for six and makes you go WOW. But this one sure does. It's part of a movement a number of bands are going for recently where they hold an open competition for fans to create their own video for their latest single and the best one gets the accolade of becoming the 'official' video, going on to be serviced to the media etc. It cuts down costs for the band/record label and the fans get a cool competition and potential massive-kudos, acclaim and all round feeling of amazingness if their entry is chosen as the winner.
And so we have OMD's new single History of Modern (Part 1) - directed by Sweden's Lapantafilm, I love their stop-motion approach to the video. I don't know how long it must have taken to film but the end result is absolutely incredible. The references to past OMD album covers is very cool too, as is the a-ha Take On Me vibe that the whole thing has. Brilliant stuff.
OMD, as a band, are masters of indentifying the best parts of their extensive back-catalogue and skilfully re-investing them them back into their newest project – re-enhanced sounds for a new audience but with all the familiarity the long-term fans will adore too. If You Want It was the triumphant return, packed with all the epic grandeur the band could master, twinned with a knack for lyrics that at their best are pure poetry in motion.
In the case of History Of Modern (Part 1), there’s a definite vibe of perhaps their most well known hit Enola Gay. It’s got that optimistic, cheery skip to it – an almost call-and-response synth line. There’s a constant, thumping beat to it too; relentless, energetic – a reminder that even now, more than 30 years since OMD graced the airwaves, that they are still just as talented as songwriters, just as enthused about making great synth-pop for the masses.
Sister Marie Says was a slightly predictable single choice, with its impact also rather dampened by the fact a demo version of it had already been given as a free download in the run-up to the album release. So it’s something of a joy to see the band go for this, a more adventurous single choice from an album where so many of the tracks could be singles. Hey, it even has a cool title in the form of that rather marvellous (Part 1). Now how many song names have that in them?
You also get the gorgeous cover artwork too – I’ve always been a fan of all the singles from an album era having similar covers that tie together; so when those covers are made by design legend Peter Saville, that idea of cohesion is emphasised even more. There’s something inherently collectable about them all – just imagine them looking all neat and glossy next to each-other!
The CD release of the single is conveniently packed with all the b-sides from across the entire album era and a number of new remixes of History Of Modern itself, including one by Selebrities which you can hear below.
History Of Modern (Part 1) is released February 28th.
There’s a great range of free music available to download freely as part of various offers online at the moment!
You’ve got Ke$ha’s new single We R Who We R available here when you sign up to her mailing list.
Then here on Amazon you’ve got a whole host of free tracks including songs by Hannah Montana, Swedish House Mafia, OMD and Magnetic Man. Brilliant stuff!
I’ve been listening to OMD’s brilliant new album History of Modern a fair bit recently, so I was rather excited to hear there’ll be a second single taken from it, coming out next month! Sister Marie Says is classic OMD, a massive synth hook propelling a track that could have come straight out of the band’s 80s heyday. And for that, the song works a treat. The band have always excelled at blending catchy melodies with quirky, witty lyrics, and this track doesn’t disappoint.
For me, it doesn’t quite reach the joyous anthemic qualities that the album’s lead single If You Want It boasted, but it’s a more than solid contribution to OMD’s stellar discography. Oooh, and the prospect of new b-sides and remixes is always rather exciting too.
