Jan 29 2010 11:10 am,
Hot Chip
‘One Life Stand’
(Parlophone)
Songs about fidelity aren’t very rock’n’roll, but nobody does un-rock’n’roll like Hot Chip, and, here, they’ve well and truly turned that into an art form. Joyous steel drums and jubilant real drums punctuate the keyboard cavalcades, Alexis Taylor’s bewitchingly bewildered croon is augmented by audaciously cavalier co-vocals, and there’s a penchant for dancefloor dynamics that’ll dazzle old and new ravers alike (the build of ‘Thieves In The Night’ is absurdly epic, while the sinister piano runs on ‘Take It In’ are horrorhouse gold); plus, they even make themselves enemies of archness via the career-best poignancy of ‘Brothers’. Going toe-to-toe with the Betas and Furries in terms of wilful bizarreness and evocative imagination, their underdog days are thoroughly over; more than ever, Hot Chip are entirely on fire...
Iain Moffat
