infadels - we are not the infadels
this london collective at last get around to releasing their debut album. having read about them a few years ago i became aware of their blend of rock-n-rave, but here we are at last with the summation of their supposedly legendary full action live show. ok, in their promo pictures the band may appear like some cast offs from some scissor sisters covers band, but when the needle drops in the silver grooves it becomes very obvious as to the bands musical heritage - new order, underworld, audiobullys, lo-fi allstarts and even emf all get stylistic nods across the albums 11 tracks. while several styles are plundered the album has a certain lightweight fun appeal, it's not a serious album, it's an album to play when getting ready for those wage blowing, binge drinking, 6 hours on a saturday night that so many people need to get over their dull 9-5 existence. as the main focal point of the music is the beat, energy, and party vibes, lyrically the band play it easy making for several sing-a-long chants, with simplistic references to online porn, modern text culture and the eventual comedown of sunday morning.
for the first 5 tracks the album races along at a fine pace where the rock band give it their all, power chords crash in all the right places, underpinned by all manner of throbbing synthetic bass lines, like some mad mash of electro goldfrapps techno toys and a relatively straight forward indie-dance band. in fact, if you stripped away the electro touches, i reckon the album would be a far far duller 43 minutes, and the band knows it, as the electroclash synths are up front in the mix, almost to the point of excess. demonstrating just how close to the dance fraternity that the music is, providing obvious points to extend and let rip in an old school acid house monster groove when played live. thankfully though, with several tracks being carefully looked after by masters of the game, jagz kooner and hugo nicholson, the two genres (rock and dance) fit rather well.
while the album is by no means a classic ('baggy revivial!'), it is a lot of easy on the ear, fun on the feet, dance grooved rock music, and sometimes, that's not a bad thing.