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Strange Idols

It's No Fun / Old Times

Label: Shady Lane Release Date: 16/10/2006

16787
holliy by holliy October 17th, 2006

Ah, indie: a genre so easy to reduce to cliché. One can so often predict the exact ingredients – and the sum total of the sound they’ll make – long before the record’s played: jangling guitars; vocals doing the Patented Morrissey Slide; drums which provide enough beat to dance to without ever doing anything so controversial as thrash; a general sense of nostalgia and genteel lovelorn longing.

Me, I prefer my music with a bit more of the unexpected about it, and thwarting expectations isn’t exactly what Strange Idols are about. They tick all the above boxes with glee, making no bones about their love for the indiepop heyday of Postcard Records. So, like, if you don’t like indie, don’t buy this…

And if you do like indie? Then giving Strange Idols a spin might be a good idea. Firstly, because they dance through the old clichés with endearing enthusiasm and casual competence. Secondly, because they round their sound off with a load of sweet and soaring boy-girl harmonies which are actually quite lovely. And, finally, because they have a quite ridiculous amount of charm, meaning that if you’ve even the slightest tendency to forgive people for being a tad predictable then it won’t be long before Strange Idols have jangled through the chink in your armour and into your affections in a way that they haven’t quite managed with me.

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