Metronomy - Nights Out

by Tom Mendelsohn

Transcendent

"Going out on a limb here – but not much of one – this is easily one of the albums of the year."

Chances are, you'll have heard of Metronomy (native Devonian Joseph Mount) more in his capacity as a remixer rather than as a musician and band-leader in his own right. He's put it about a bit alright, remixwise, having bent out of shape songs from, among others, Franz Ferdinand, Architecture In Helsinki, Klaxons, Gorillaz, and Kate Nash. Unofficial remixes of Britney Spears, U2 and Bright Eyes have frotted the blogosphere hard, according to wikipedia, though not in so many words, and he's quite the tastemaker darling at the moment. He also, it says, briefly dated Sarah Harding out of Girls Aloud, making him quite the fanny magnate.

It just so happens, then, that he and his band (featuring Gabriel Stebbing and Oscar Cash; also called Metronomy) have put needle to wax or whatever on a blinding album.

As mission statements go, making 'a half-arsed concept album about going out and having a crap time' is pretty wonderful. In many ways, this album of delirious, twisted electropop pinions its proposed subject matter. Lyrically, it's all about how girls are rubbish and nightclubs are usually sucky, and it's done in the best kind of droll, unpretentious way. Musically, though, they get it wrong: they've made the music too good. Metronomy's signature thing seems to be intricate synth riffs, the likes of which few if any other band can match for flair or imagination.

Brilliantly, the band doesn't seem too bothered about being cool, and they don’t take themselves too seriously either. Their videos are rad, also.

It's not entirely consistent in quality – there's no genuine filler here, and the barmy harmonic flourishes don't let up – but not every song reaches a uniform pinnacle of excellence. At his best, as on singles Radio Ladio, Holiday and My Heart Rate Rapid, he really goes to town, making sounds of no small magnificence which totally fucking destroy on the dancefloor. It tails off a little towards the end, but what album doesn't? Don't be churlish!

Going out on a limb here – but not much of one – this is easily one of the albums of the year. For Joseph Mount's sheer capacity to get synthesisers to make magical sounds alone, it's worth a huge amount. It really does do fresh and different things with electronic music, and it gives what has become a bit of a staid medium quite a bit of welly, in the same way that The Knife managed to a couple of years ago. Even though he doesn't get it right every single time, there are more than enough truly pulsating moments here that the record deserves to be very fucking big.

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