Metronomy
It’s rare this side of the Atlantic to get an album that is essentially a love-letter to a band’s home town, but in Metronomy’s The English Riviera, us Brits have something to rival anything The Beach Boys ever came up with.
Metronomy started in the bedroom of Joe Mount after being given an old computer by his dad. Inspired by Warp Records artists like LFO, Autechre and Aphex Twin, Mount subsequently made a hobby of making and perfecting his instrumental electronic music from his home in Totnes, Devon.
After relocating to Brighton for university, Mount turned pro and released his mostly-instrumental debut album Pip Paine (Pay the £5000 You Owe). After influential DJ and producer Erol Alkan picked up on lead single ‘You Could Easily Have Me’ and started to play it in his sets, Mount went about building a live band, consisting of himself, cousin Oscar Cash and friend Gabriel Stebbing.
Two years later the band released Nights Out, a ‘half-arsed concept album about going out and having a crap time’, which signalled a re-invention of the band. Most of the songs now featured Mount’s vocals, and thanks to the influence of Cash and Stebbing sounded more suited to a live stage than anything on Pip Paine…. A string of superb singles increased Metronomy’s profile, with the likes of ‘Heartbreaker’ and ‘My Heart Rate Rapid’ making many of 2008’s ‘Best Of’ lists. Unfortunately their danceable indie got them lazily thrown into the New Rave category, betraying many of the subtleties and quirks in their music.
Metronomy’s charming live performances have helped to strengthen their reputation as one of the country’s best indie bands, with a stage show that features each member having a touch-activated (later replaced by pre-programmed) lamp strapped to their chest, incorporated into choreographed routines. It’s not to everyone’s taste, but there’s no doubt that the performance adds a sense of fun to events that are so often saturated by bands taking themselves a little too seriously.
Shortly after Nights Out was released, Stebbing left the band to concentrate on his own project, Your Twenties, and Metronomy 2.0 was born, adding drummer Anna Prior and bassist Gbenga Adelekan to the lineup.
For the band’s third album Mount wanted to ditch some of the cynicism that seeped through Nights Out, and replace it with something warmer and more affectionate. The resulting product, The English Riviera is full of nostalgia, containing seaside noises and musical motifs that will ring bells for anyone who’s spent a summer on the south coast (even/especially if it was at Butlins). There are still some potential dance floor staples amongst the tracks (‘The Look’, ‘The Bay’, ‘Corinne’), but compared to its predecessor, The English Riviera is a far smoother affair, echoing the laid-back sound of albums made on the Californian coast.
Cementing Mount’s place as something of a genius, Metronomy have an impressive back-catalogue of remixes, covering artists from U2 to The Very Best, with not a stinker among them. Remixes have always been a feature of Metronomy’s single releases too, with 2009’s Not Made For Love EP featuring no less than six, by the likes of Joakim and Wild Geese. Past remixes have come from Primary 1, Micachu and the titans of donk, Blackout Crew.
Metronomy 2.0 look set to have another album lauded over by critics, and deservedly so. Originality has always been one of their strengths, and their new album’s carefree naivety definitely sets it apart from most music created with the dance floor in mind. Look out for more Metronomy covereage on Rockfeedback very soon, but in the meantime you’d be advised to get yourself down to one of their tour dates and to check out their brilliant video for ‘She Wants’, featuring an intro by Rockfeedback’s very own Tom Hannan.
Tour Dates
14 Apr: Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
15 Apr: Norwich Waterfront
16 Apr London, Shepherds Bush Empire
17 Apr Portsmouth, Wedgewood Rooms
19 Apr: Brighton, Digital
20 Apr: Oxford, O2 Academy 2
21 Apr: Cardiff, Clwb Ifor Bach
22 Apr: Wakefield, The Hop
24 Apr: Newcastle, O2 Academy 2
25 Apr: Edinburgh, Cabaret Voltaire
26 Apr: Aberdeen, The Tunnels
27 Apr: York, The Duchess
20 Sep: Southampton, Talking Heads
21 Sep: Leeds, Cockpit
22 Sep: Sheffield, Leadmill
23 Sep: Glasgow, Oran Mor
24 Sep: Liverpool, Kazimier
26 Sep: Manchester, Academy 3
27 Sep: Birmingham, HMV Institute
28 Sep: Bristol, Trinity
Links
Music Videos
She Wants:
Heartbreaker