New York DJ and producer James Murphy’s project LCD Soundsystem has been straddling the worlds of rock and electro-pop for a few years now.
From its 2005 debut through to 2007’s excellent Sound of Silver the project has been picking up a solid following among both club-goers and indie rock fans, particularly in the UK.
On his latest album ‘This Is Happening’ he’s kept the 80s synth pop/ rock sound of Sound of Silver, tweaked a knob here and there and come up with one of the best albums of the year.
Rumours are this will be Murphy’s last outing as LCD Soundsystem. If that’s true he’s going out on a high, once again beautifully merging rock with dance and punk with pop. Along the way he’s created a wonderful mood, injected the album with a good slice of humour and evoked the sounds of the synth pioneers of 1970s Germany and 1980s England.
This Is Happening opener ‘Dance Yrself Clean’ starts off low key, a hint of cowbell , soft vocals but gradually building up to a full on rock track.Next up is ‘Drunk Girls’. At just under four minutes it is the shortest track on the album and the only true single, featuring a great sing-along chorus and keyboards from the school of early Eurythmics (that is if such a bizarre education concept could ever get past school inspectors). I have mixed feelings about this track. It is undeniably a good single, but seems slightly out of place on the rest of an album that delights in lengthy build-ups and taking its time. Great video though.
‘One Touch’ for example is nearly eight minutes long and needs all eight of them to get its point across. It’s also one of the most reminiscent on the album of UK synth pop legends such as OMD and Human League.
At times the album veers back in time further, to the European synth sounds of the 1970s that David Bowie and Lou Reed were drawn to. ‘All I Want’ for example, while being more rock than electro pop, has a central guitar riff straight out of Heroes era Bowie.
‘I Can Change’ shows a man in love with early Depeche Mode and ‘You Wanted A Hit’ is where all Murphy’s synth-irony buttons are pressed, as at nine minutes its far from hit length and takes a good couple of minutes for even the drums and bass to kick in. ‘You want a hit, but maybe we don’t do hits”, says Murphy suggesting that in many ways the track could be LCD Soundsystem’s signature tune. The project is on one hand potentially singles chart friendly, drawing on classic styles of rock and pop, but on the other it retains a quirkiness and penchant for long tracks that makes such bubble-gum pop success unlikely.
8/10
by Joe Lepper, May 2010
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