Ladytron - 'Light & Magic' (Invicta Hi-Fi / Telstar)
4/5
By: Joshua K
All right, rock(feedback) kids, let's jump right into this. There's this group called Ladytron that you've been hearing about, yeah? Four musicians from Euroland who share an impeccable taste in eyeliner, black clothing and 80's synth sounds and who've just released this, their second album...
These above facts, along with the band's retro-future-sounding title, have led the style-mags to lump them in with all the elegant slummers from Berlin and Williamsburgh. But don't you make the same mistake, taking the lazy route and calling them elec***cl**h. Because there's a lot more creativity and real feeling here than simply some chancers who've heard a Human League record at a school disco once in their lives.
First single 'Seventeen' you may know, a sweeping, cold-as-steel tune mixed with a foreboding central phrase condemning style culture ('They only want you when you're seventeen/When you're twenty-one, you're no fun'). 'Flicking Your Switch', on the other hand, is nothing short of a pumping house track - but the beat's a Trojan Horse, concealing a more conflicted lyrical core ('Does this mean you don't trust me anymore?'). 'Blue Jeans' pulls a similar trick, dreamy pop at its finest while subverting the form, as 'Cease2xist' conjures the spirit of, shockingly, Lush, what with its layered vox, in spite of its driving pulse, which is as far from shoe-gazing as you can possible get. Even 'Evil', which may be a bit Bananarama for some, is a guilty pleasure if you let it be.
Yes, Ladytron do manage a neat trick: fusing two of the key touchstones of modern electronic pop music (Kraftwerk and New Order) with the heart and soul of sixties girl-groups. Imagine a female Barney Sumner singing 'Blue Monday'... vocals that initially come across as chillingly cold, but whose interaction with the musical tones paints a complex tapestry of sound that's always richer than the individual parts should logically allow.
Well, you get the picture. Now go get this record.
Artists in this article: Ladytron
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