Review: Hot Chip – One Life Stand
The most noticeable difference between One Life Stand and Hot Chip’s past work is how smooth it sounds. The jarring, less than melodious bits of noise that dotted older material have been replaced by a largely uninterrupted 50 minutes of safe streamlined pop. Whereas tracks like “Over and Over” flitted manically between dance-pop choruses and more abstract, formless sections, tracks on the new record are a fair bit more restrained. The six minute opener “Thieves in the Night” is a straight forward slab of peppy synths with a friendly guitar line, and the steady pulse and rhythm of “Hand me Down Your Love” is suspiciously ordinary and un-eclectic.
Unfortunately, cleaner isn’t always better. After listening to this release several times, the only honest way to describe it is “boring”. Minimalist indie/electronica works best when it’s switched up constantly and consistently, so even though its body is pretty thin it has enough nice outfits to make you forget about it’s anorexia (see: LCD soundsystem). But when the dominant instrument is always the synthesizer, the lack of real substance starts to grate a little. This is particularly true on “I feel Better”, which mixes goofily ominous violins with already saccharine vocals layered through a Cher-like vocoder. It’s just too cheesy and ridiculous to really merit more than one listen, and isn’t nearly enough of a pop gem to work as well as the more suave “Believe”. “Keep Quiet” suffers from similar issues, like monotonous percussion and lacklustre vocals only being made worse by the melodrama dripping from the strings.
The tracks that do work are, surprisingly, the most emotionally honest and earnest. “Brothers” is Taylor’s endearing ode to, whom else, but his brohas. This arena rock imitation starts with U2-sounding atmospherics and deep, cutesy vocals, and builds to drums and piano accompaniment, as well as more rich vocal harmonies chanting the chorus. The song is infinitely better for the adorable lyrics, chronicling the Taylor bros and their heart-warming relationship, which involves sharing “wild” love, dancing (whether its salsa or swing is not specified) and the ultimate in male bonding activities, games on the x-box. “Alley cats” follows a similar formula. It’s subject matter is somewhat more ambiguous (read: indiscernible), but its chorus is sung in that same wonderfully goofy tone of voice, bringing a smile to this face every time Taylor (that IS him right?) sings the word “alley cats”. Again, the simple keyboard and excited guitar squiggles work largely because the song is just so darn endearing. It`s sappiness can`t carry the whole song and it gets tiresome after the first couple of minutes, but only the scrupulous listener will probably even notice.
The next issue with the album is that some of its quirks are just plain weird. For example, “Slush” opens with a series of melodic “hum-ah-nah hum-ah-nahs”, which are more irritating than innovating. “We Have Love” works in the same way, opening with an odd and pretty pointless sample of what sounds like a Chipmunk at a rave in Barcelona. But even when the record’s more absurd elements fade out and flow into more conventional songs, Taylor and co. reveal more of what makes the record weak in the first place. Once the quirks on the weirder tracks go away, they simply give way to the brutal balladry that just weighs down the merit the release DOES have. This observation begs the question: why bother having weirdness on an album in the first place if all it does is (briefly) distract from an otherwise safe, straightforward soundscape?
In sum, One Life Stand is a generally disappointing record. Hot Chip aren`t known for their strong albums, but they usually manage to write at least a couple of damn good singles every time they put one out. This, unfortunately, is not the case for their most recent output. No tracks stand out as potential sleeper hits, and few manage to rise out of what turns out to be pretty fluffy, derivative and mediocre nostalgia for the 1980`s. On a positive note, some of the cutesier tracks could probably be performed on one of the more indie-friendly children`s TV shows (Yo Gabba Gabba anyone?). Ultimately though, it feels like these solid representatives of the indie electronica scene might finally be checking out. Hopefully the boys in Hot Chip can rebound and not end up like everything else from the neo-80’s (IE 2002-06): forgotten in a blurry haze of The Strokes rip-offs and hipster hangovers.
