Metronomy >> This is a band about growth. If you can even call it a band, rather, Metronomy is the evolution of Joseph Mount tinkering with a shitty drum set and crude music software in his childhood bedroom to playing the Regency Ballroom with his band in matching white suits playing a catalog that spans 8 years.
It is no surprise that 8 years, 4 albums in, you might not have heard of them before. Metronomy is what I call a car commercial band. Although their songs have never actually been in a car commercial, they hold that special place where they are popular enough, and the song is catchy enough to see some mainstream use, but in general, no one really knows who you are due to your Indie sensibilities. The turnout at the Regency would attest to that, as only the faithful seemed to come out this evening. Joseph and his ilk are very talented musicians; their compositions are complex, catchy and original. However it has always been challenging to put a finger on what type of band they are, what their music is, and thus it has always been difficult to become any more than a casual listener.
One could pick any Metronomy song and compare it to Kraftwerk, or Hot Chip, or Fleetwood Mac or Joy Division or the Beach Boys or Stephan Malkmus or Pharrell or ABBA all in the same album! And while a band should be able to surprise you, there is a line that can be crossed, in which your listener has no idea why they are listening to you. If I am in the mood to listen to a certain something, I can almost never pick an entire Metronomy album to satiate that fix. On top of this, it takes a deft hand to mix Lo-Fi rock and electronic music effectively and I never felt Metronomy was able to ever truly do this [listen to Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and Oracular Spectacular for prime examples of doing this well].
This has been true for me until their latest album Love Letters. In my humble opinion, this is the only album of theirs you should listen to. Listen to Metronomy’s remixes, listen to a few tracks from their other albums, but Love Letters is the first true masterpiece from this band. This album feels like Metronomy has become a band, understands and uses its influences and Joseph’s ingenuity to create a cohesive sound. That’s not to say the album is predictable. The first track, ‘The Upsetter’, sounds like a Bowie song with a 1989 Casio keyboard drum beat. Believe me when I tell you that’s a very good thing. The very next track is a sinister sounding modern R&B with song with multiple pipe organs and Doo-Wop background vocals. However, this time around there is a maturity and an aesthetic to the songs that sync with one another to create a singular style. I can finally place Metronomy in a genre and that genre is Lo-Fi Swedish Electronic Cruise Guitar Pop Written By An English Songwriter In A Post-9/11 World…which would have been my favorite section of Tower Records if they still existed.
As the Metronomy graced the stage, stylish as fuck in their matching suits, with an art deco pink and blue cloud Backdrop that looks like it was stolen from the set of Metropolis in 1927, you got the sense that they cared about the showmanship of it all. That they knew we were here to see a show and not just listen to music. All members are multi instrumentals [as they had to be, remember when I said their songs are all over the place!] which was fun to see as they moved around the stage from song to song. However, regardless of the production and design decisions, every member of Joseph’s crew are incredibly charming; from the tall Grace Jones like Gbenga Adelekan running a train on the Regency Ball room with him on one end and his bass guitar in the middle to Anna Prior’s magma-like red hair bouncing around as she slammed on the drums. Yes I know…it’s cliché….a hot chick drummer….but seriously it was fucking hot.
While it may be unlikely I will try to catch them again live, I will continue to listen to Love Letters, and you should too.
Carmichael
