Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Ice Choir - afar (Underwater Peoples)

The best album of 2012. 

There i have said it, no ambiguity about that statement this is as good as it gets, and its very very good. The Ice Choir reinvents late 80s synth pop with a mixture of hipster cool and funky techno fun, merging classic synth and 80s pop sounds with modern tech-savvy lyrics. At first listen you might think they ("they" being mostly Kurt Feldman - the drummer in the Pains of Being Pure At Heart) are taking the piss but its far more than that. Its a loving and knowledgable recreation of late 80s sounds beautifully polished and slick like the best of Scritti Politti.

As with Kurt's previous project The Depreciation Guild at the heart of the Ice Choir isn't retro-ness or an encyclopaedic knowledge of a past music scene beyond the stuff "everyone knows" (though these do help) but simply great tunes. The pop hooks of the likes of "A vision of hell, 1996" and "Two rings" with its electro-ish beat are sublime along with the techno-soundscapes of "Teletrips" and "I want you now and always". Its the best album of 2012, its probably also the best album of the 1980s.

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