Foals - Balloons Video

Directed by Dave Ma

We Don't Need Honesty

On Friday I saw London’s latest Post-Punk hopefuls ‘Electricity in Our Homes’ play 93 Feet East in Brick Lane. The sound was terrible but I got the gist of what was going on and liked what I could discern within the cavernous reverberant din of the venues band room. On their myspace they list Postcard Records as an influence but (save a riff lifted wholesale from Josef K’s ‘Fun and Frenzy’) EIOH are less the Sound of Young Scotland, more the sound of late 70’s Lower East Side NY, with DNA and Teenage Jesus and The Jerks offering more obvious points of reference for their taut and clipped No-Wave.

The bands combination of cut glass guitars, monotone vocals and shirts done up to the top button has been well worn (particularly in London) to the point of cliché, but the curiously tribal effect produced by the lack of syncopation in their rhythm section gives EIOH a distinct identity and a definite edge over their peers. By its nature the music is repetitive and discordant but no track is allowed to outstay its welcome; Electricity In Our Homes songs don’t so much finish as stop dead in their tracks the minute they’ve said all they need to say.
I’m still unsure whether closing the set with their deconstruction of punk standard ‘Louie Louie’ (a tribute undoubtedly to the famed ‘Jon the Postman’, who clambered on stage to sing the Kingsmans number at the end of Fall and Joy Division gigs) was inspired or one of the worst examples of self consciously referential art school cynicism I’ve ever witnessed.
Probably both, in which case all credit to them.

And they've all got Misfits T-Shirts...

It took me a while to work out whether or not it was ok to like Johnny Foreigner. On the one hand they make great, catchy pop-core that sounds like the bastard child of At The Drive-In and Los Campesinos. On the other there’s something I find irksome about bands like JF; bands that is who are so evidently in thrall to all things US indie that they find themselves not only appropriating the melodic sensibilities of their transatlantic counterparts but also, at times, lapsing into faux American accents.
In the end though I just went with it. The free 15 track demo 'I Like You Mostly Late At Never' (download here) contains the foundations for some of the finest boy/girl post-whatever since Pretty Girls Make Graves called it a day. Plus when I found out they came from Birmingham the American vocal inflections suddenly seemed a lot easier to bare. Upcoming sessions for Radio 1 and gigs for Vice, Drowned in Sound, XFM and Artrocker suggest the Brum threesome will be suitably massive this time next year, if not before. Apparently they also featured on a battle of the bands style TV show called 'Road to V' which is a shame, but I never saw that so couldn't really comment.
Be sure to download the 'Sofa Core' Mp3 below as it's ace.

Johnny Foreigner - Sofa Core