More on: Alphabeat

Date: 25/01/08
Rating:

"We're Alphabeat and we play pop music!" screams the over-zealous tambourine player, almost crying with excitement. A simple description of simple music for simple people. If Alphabeat were English teenagers with matching outfits and dance moves, this audience would be a completely different demographic. As it is, Danish and kooky-looking, this unashamed cheese-fest is foreign and retro enough for arty intellectuals to admit to.

All around, the audience is doing the 'bonding-bop': taking photos, hugging, smiling and dancing away, and Alphabeat are clearly as thrilled as their crowd. Jumping around in a riot of colour, sequins and day-glo caps, their emotional commitment to this infectious brand of bubblegum pop is both irritating and endearing. They come across as excitable puppies – but everybody loves puppies, right?

You have to admit, they are exemplary at what they do. The performance is musically solid, almost studio-perfect, and wildly entertaining. They storm through tracks, delivering a contagious blend of funky bass, catchy vocal lines and storming synth solos, with a greedy helping of tambourine and pleasant major-key melodies. Poptastic 'Boyfriend', with lyrics about annoying parents and "uncool friends" is straight out of High School Musical, while fluffy 'Fascination' borrows an intro from The Jam's 'Town Called Malice'. '10,000 Nights Of Thunder', with chord progressions straight from Steps, demonstrates strong three-part vocal harmonies and a new rockier sound, as the synth gives way to deafening percussion. And despite the banal repetition of "touch me, touch you" in the final song, they ended with a glimpse at a maturer sound with interesting drumming and shouting in place of clichéd vocal lines.

Occasionally the synth, double-pace drumming and girly vocals move the style from 80s disco to early happy hardcore, but on the whole it is the soundtrack to your mother's hen party. It is surprising that the enthusiastic disco-popping indie kids don't put their neon brogues and vintage clutches on the floor and dance around them, the white stilettos of the modern age.

Kookier than Kylie, but lacking the originality of Architecture In Helsinki or the emotional subtext of The Knife, Alphabeat are impossible to categorise. Beneath their undeniably charismatic presence, the music is actually too bland and wholly derivative to place. This isn't just cheese – it's enough vintage cheddar to satiate even the greediest of mice. Alphabeat seem to be attempting to put a sparkly leg-warmered foot in both pop and indie-lite camps. It is at least a genuine, sincere pop sound, offering a refreshing antidote to the engineered drone of the latest X-Idol-Pop-Factor robot. Judging by the crowd, could it be that the indie world has had enough of navel-gazing, beard-groping bands? Do we want music we can switch off and bop to? One thing's for sure: Alphabeat grow on you. They may be this year's band you love to hate (or hate to love) but you'll definitely catch yourself humming their infectious pop at some time. So dip your toe in the surf - you certainly won’t drown in a sound this shallow.

Holly Dawson

Alphabeat Official Site
Alphabeat Myspace