Ladyhawke - Ladyhawke
|
Ladyhawke
Modular
6 / 10
22 November 2008
By James Smith
|
What the shit is with this disco/synth revival? And what the shit is with Ladyhawke’s debut album artwork? (Disgustingly coloured cats feature throughout.) Both are horrendous. Not saying this is a bad record (in fact Ladyhawke pulls of this genre of music rather convincingly), it’s just a bit hit and miss. Going quite often from an absolute cracker of a pop track, to a dire disco cry, choking in synthesizers. The decent songs on Ladyhawke are fantastic but the rest, are average at best.
Ladyhawke A.K.A Phillipa “Pip” Brown , originally from Masterton, New Zealand , is the current darling of the NME (New Musical Express) and is making huge waves over in Britain and Europe at the moment. You would’ve heard from the multi-instrumentalist by now with singles such as “Paris Is Burning”, “Back of the Van” and “Dusk Till Dawn” which have all been gaining regular air-play on music television and student radio.
She is a self-proclaimed 80s musical revivalist, stating that she wants to give listeners a feeling of nostalgia, and make them revisit a certain time in their life even though it may be their first time hearing her songs. She does this in part with stellar New Romanticism tunes such as “Another Runaway” and “Love Don’t Live Here” but fails with utter disco crap like “Manipulating Woman” and “Professional Suicide”.
Listening to this album, you can just imagine a nightclub going off, from Auckland’s inner city all the way to London or Paris. Every track is easy to dance to, but the thing is not every track is that good. The lyrics flow nicely in each song with no words sounding like they are being crammed into a sentence or forced which just shows Brown’s natural flair for songwriting.
Signed to renowned Australian label Modular and produced by herself and songwriting partner Pascal Gabriel, Ladyhawke’s debut is smooth sounding. The vocals are clear and crunchy and the instruments don’t sound too over-shaped and inorganic. Unlike other pop contemporaries, you can tell a live band is playing on this record which should translate well to the live stage.
“Ladyhawke” is a patchy album with highs and lows in equal supply. It is a cool, radio-friendly record which will undoubtedly go down well in clubs and at live gigs likewise. The production is polished and slick and the lyrics are smart and savvy with Brown sounding a self-assured vocalist. What lets this album down is inconsistency. She can quite obviously write a brilliant pop hook and hopefully her next effort is more constant than this one.
By James Smith
| public rating: |
0/10
(0 votes)
|
| original rating: |
6/10 |
| your vote » |
|
See more from Ladyhawke
Album Review Homepage
add your gig
