| Print |

Written by Daniel O'Malley Thursday, 27 April 2006 09:31

With an album cover so similar to the Talking Heads’ More Songs About Buildings and Food that it must be an intentional homage of sorts, the Robocop Kraus make no attempt at hiding their infatuation with post-punk and new wave—so at least we know what they want to be.

Interesting title choice. The group could’ve just as easily gone with “They Think They Are the Talking Heads” or “They Think They Are in 1978.” But instead, they let us wonder just what it is they think they are. With an album cover so similar to the Talking Heads’ More Songs About Buildings and Food that it must be an intentional homage of sorts, the Robocop Kraus make no attempt at hiding their infatuation with post-punk and new wave—so at least we know what they want to be.

But really, there’s nothing terribly special about bands right now that try to capitalize on the sounds of the ’70s and ’80s. The thing about this Nuremberg, Germany–based outfit, though, is that they do it pretty well, and to their credit, they’ve been at it since 1999, back before it was “cool” again.

Produced by Pelle Gunnerfeldt (the Hives), They Think They Are the Robocop Kraus is the group’s fourth full-length offering, though it’s the first to see an international release. Jumpy and energetic throughout, the album is a tightly wound nugget of retro pop. Drums, bass, guitar, and keyboard—an at-times overpowering and unnecessary amount of keyboard, you might say—come together in a frenzy. The result is an epileptic sort of tension that builds and builds before giving way to choruses made for chanting and hand clapping.

Thomas Lang’s vocals, by contrast, often delve into heavier territory. “You Don’t Have to Shout” tells the story of Mathias Rust, who infamously piloted a Cessna into communist Russia’s Red Square. Another track, “Concerned, Your Secular Friends,” deals with the group’s former bass player’s abandonment of music in favor of religion—he found God while traveling through Amsterdam, of all places.

Tracks such as “In Fact You’re Just Fiction” showcase the band at their best, with jagged guitar riffs allowed precedence over punchy keyboards and Lang’s vocals sounding more direct and urgent than snotty and pretentious.

RIYL: Talking Heads, Franz Ferdinand

Purchase downloads for this artist at our BurnLounge.