REVIEW: Metronomy – The English Riviera

Metronomy’s 2008 album Nights Out was a brilliant affair, a mash of 8-bit electronica, dance, indie and synth-pop madness with vocals drowned in effects and this year’s follow-up, The English Riviera, had a lot to live up to. Frontman and Producer, Joseph Mount, has definitely exceeded expectations laid down for the group. After Gabriel Stebbing’s departure in early 2009, Mount and Oscar Cash were joined by Anna Prior and Gbenga Adelekan and have rounded themselves in to not only a stronger and dynamic live outfit but also a more fully-fledged band which has noticeably been taken advantage of in this new album.

The album’s titular introduction has nautical leanings that offer much of a clue to how the album goes on to sound. An alluring, electronic take on nights beside the sea, on dark romantic interludes between promenades and piers. It’s Nights Out, moving away from the city and holidaying in a seaside resort. Songs like “We Broke Free” and new single “The Look” seem the manifestation of the feelings and emotions when meeting a girl on holiday, who you’ll never see again, but fall in love with all the same.

Though there are tracks like the brilliant prior-released “She Wants”, contrastingly tinged with darker emotion. It’s a similar effect for one of the highlights, “Corinne”, a name-checking attack and plead with the eponymous girl. Describing the lyrical persona’s fall due to her influence, you get a real sense of story-telling with Mount’s lyrics. You feel for and identify with him and as the album moves into the sombre “Some Unwritten”, The English Riviera shifts into what seems like never-ending sadness on that post-holiday journey home before it erupts in a crescendo of noise. With the concluding track, “Love Underlined”, the group provides you with a typically brilliant, energetic and erratic Metronomy jam that ties the album together nicely.

But, it’s the track “The Bay” which is the real stand-out effort here. A strong bridging between the more electro-pop stylings of these new tracks and the older Metronomy material makes it an essential pick, having an unforgettable sound that you’ll find hard not to dance along to. Despite his assertions that “This isn’t Paris and this isn’t London and it’s not Berlin and it’s not Hong Kong, not Tokyo,” this mythical “Bay”‘s soundscape, much like the rest of the album, is so exciting, inviting and vivid that you’ll be thankful that Mount’ll “take you back one day.”

STREAM: “The Bay” + “Corinne”
[soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/12152585"]
[soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/12500021"]
BUY: Amazon