Is it just me, my age or my gender, or would the world really be an actual better place if 70s cop show theme tunes were piped constantly onto the streets, day and night, rain or shine? Christ, of course it would. And we’d all obviously be more use in The War Against Terrorism. They want us all to be more attentive? Well what better way? Every day you’d wake up, step out of the front door and straight into the Beastie Boys’ ‘Sabotage’ video. You wouldn’t be able to cross a street without pegging it to duck behind the nearest parked taxi, or negotiate a corner without throwing yourself against a wall and raising your hands to your chest in mock firearm motion. All of which has made the walk to the office a great deal more enjoyable since this album has been resident in my Walkman.
Not that it follows such a directly kitch path throughout, but on opener ‘G-Plan’ you can practically feel suspicious eyes tracking your every move from behind the stealth Pink-Panther-esque bass-line. And ‘Montparnasse’ just sounds like it was recorded after dark, undercover and in a big beige mac. The bass-line is constantly out-front though. In spite of the title there is nothing remotely Parisian-dancefloor here (that’s a reference to a French library music label of which Jon Brookes aka KoW is keen). It’s more a Dubstar summer vibe pervading it all when the album levels out, especially with its increased leaning towards guest female vocalists.
Effectively picking up from where his ‘Ming Star’ debut left off, this is actually an altogether more surefooted record. Bolder, more caricatured, confident. Though quite a change of tack from epic chill-out single ‘Bakerloo’ for which he’s probably best known, the atmosphere staying closer to follow up single ‘Stalker Song’. ‘Hub 100’ goes a bit sinister like Midfield General remixing The Orb,Dot Allison’s airy sweetness slips ideally into the framework of ‘Sell Me Back My Soul’, while Emma Pollock out of the context of The Delgados adds brilliantly to the glitterball-y ‘Nuada’ like the Sarah Cracknell who sat at the back of the class and died her hair black. It does duck all over the place but with a common and solid thread of principal throughout.
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