While the world eagerly anticipates a third Pnau album, Nick Littlemore clearly has more urgent preoccupations; namely Teenager, his latest indie / dance venture alongside guitarist / vocalist Pip Brown, formerly of NZ band Two Lane Blacktop. Constructed primarily around programmed dance elements and catchy indie-rock hooks, with Littlemore handling the vocal frontman duties and most of the electronics himself, this debut album “Thirteen’ seems tailor-made for the post-Modular audience. There’s certainly more than a trace of The Strokes’ robotically precise drum rhythms in the backing beats, but while the skinny tie brigade are sure to be delighted, much of the guitar work and overall songcraft leans far closer to UK-based influences.
New Order in particular emerge as a particular reference point throughout much of this album, the fusion of angular guitar attack, stark throbbing basslines and ebbing synth pads particularly calling to mind Sumner and Co’s “Brotherhood’ era, while opener “Liquid Cement’s evokes associations more with Blur’s Damon Albarn during his reverb-heavy “13′ period. On the whole, while most of what’s on offer here is geared towards fairly straightforward indie-dance centred pop much in the vein of The Presets or Cut Copy, the songs themselves come across as having a bit more substance than much of the current Modular mob and their ilk, the sound perhaps of Littlemore putting fun before mining his record collection. Barring the one excruciating electro experiment (“Luke and Angie’) and the odd flat vocal from Littlemore, “Thirteen’ seems set to please its intended audience. And lets face it, the pube-centric sleeve art’s got to be one of the more “innovative’ marketing angles going.
Chris Downton
