Gay disco

New CDs for June

Pet Shop Boys. Fundamental (Parlophone/EMI)

Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe, the British duo Pet Shop Boys, are that rare pop group around which a real cult has developed: a considerable number of fans around the world collect singles, vinyl discs, side projects and all sorts of memorabilia associated with the duo’s work. It’s strange for a group performing such a seemingly purely utilitarian, light disco repertoire. But fans know that behind the simple song form and perky rhythms of the Pet Shop Boys there is invariably hidden some kind of second bottom: an ironic view of society, politics, world artistic culture and God knows what else. The previous albums, Nightlife and Release (not to mention the music for Potemkin), for all their charm, still have a certain bonus to the group’s earlier discography. The new album, Fundamental, is not from this series - it is absolutely what we need. It opens with the hypnotic Psychological, which mixes the stuffy hermetic sound a la Depeche Mode of the late 80s, and an unexpected sample of the voice of Russian singer Tatyana Melentyeva (borrowed from the archives of the ECM label). On the second track, The Sodom and Homorrah Show, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe delivered what they promised: dynamic disco with a modern sound (produced by their old colleague Trevor Horn) reminiscent of the duo's glorious past, while everything suggests that their main idea - disco with meaning, irony, layers of meaning - works great today. If we look for stylistic parallels, then the new I'm with Stupid can stand next to the epochal It's a Sin, the exaggerated electro-pop with the toy distorted voice of Minimal makes us remember Paninaro, and even such as I Made my Excuses and Left - a clumsy ballad, chic kitsch - there was also plenty of it back then. Pet Shop Boys are the best pop group in the world. It was, is and will be.

Dungen. Ta det lugnt (Subliminal Sounds)

We are not very well known about modern Swedish bands playing rock and alternative (metal and pop are another matter), off the top of my head I only remember the chic kitsch of Kent, who were lucky to record on a major label. A new pleasant discovery is the band Dungen with the Swedish-language album Ta det lugnt, which means “relax”. It’s not very possible to relax, since the material is notorious, unrealistically acidic sixties “psychedelia”, a kind of crazy VIA on “acid”. At first glance, Dungen are the modern heirs of the Grateful Dead's Jefferson Airplane (which came from nowhere in modern Europe). In fact, the leader of Dungen, Gustav Eystes, collected vinyl with his “small-town” art rock and psychedelia - and many of those groups, completely unknown in the world, were very popular in his homeland, even now their albums are being reissued and are in demand in Sweden. Almost all of the album's tracks are non-square compositions, improvised with a sense of proportion. Panda is a Hendrix-esque blast with a bouncy funk bassline, while Du E For Fin For Mig starts out as naïve folk-rock with lush strings and ends in complete atonal buzz. And so all the time. You won't get bored. It was funny to find out that at the end of June the group will perform in Moscow. If on stage “B2” they are as good and convincing as in the recording, then we will unanimously exclaim “rakenroll is alive!”

Collection. L'Hip-Hop Francais (SBA Gala records)

A domestic collection of French hip-hop, more than adequately presented on the Delabel label (France). French rap gained popularity in our country after the films “Taxi”, the first and second, the soundtracks of which were composed precisely from compositions of the French-language conversational genre. Well, we have it. In fact, French hip-hop as a specific subculture was formed back in the late 80s thanks to groups such as IAM and Akhenaton. At that time, their music was reminiscent of early Run DMC and at the same time MC Hammer, which by today's standards looks quite funny. Around the same time, they began to compose lyrical gangster rap ballads, which the French do no worse, and sometimes better, than the Americans. And French old-school rap based on a funk rhythm is still loved by break dancers all over the world. As for this collection, it features both new artists - Koma, Eska Crew avec Captice, and Sapan Supa Crew and Drsenik, long respected by fans of French hip-hop. It is also worth noting Passi, who recently released a very good album.

Ragga, reggae, today's fashionable R'N B with female backing vocals are present on many songs of the thematic collection, the only thing that seems to be missing is exactly that old school with a fat funk kick drum, performed by people with “brick hairstyles” heads.

As a rule, “tons” of French hip-hop are downloaded in our country via the Internet and corresponded through friends - hip-hoppers rarely buy branded CDs. Now, perhaps, the situation will improve thanks to such an inexpensive and quite decent collection.

Strokes. First Impressions of Earth (SonyBMG)

New Yorkers Strokes are a messy band, but a good one. The signature sound is extremely simple and dirty in the style of garage rock of the 60s, pleasant vocals of Julias Casablancas. Girls like it - what else is needed in this genre? Nothing. But judging by the new album, the Strokes have apparently grown as a group and immediately entered the jungle of experimentation. As a result, the new disc sounds almost like Radiohead, and Casablancas is eighty percent to blame for this. Maybe this in itself is not bad, but there is already Tommy York, and no one needs another one. Nevertheless, there are several signature Strokes songs on the album, for which it is worth loving this very group. At least when in On the Other Side Casablancas drawls lazily: “I hate them all, and I hate myself for it, I start drinking - and I love them all, then I continue drinking - and I hate them more than before.” You Only Live Once is also an excellent song, but, alas, I don’t remember anything else, with the exception of the ballad with violin Ask Me Anything.

In a word, the album turned out to be, to put it mildly, difficult for a Strokes fan to perceive, and no matter how many times you listen to it, your hand steadily reaches out to the debut album Is This It.

Alexander BELYAEV, Andrey SHERYKHANOV