Female Friday

Female Vocal / Indie Pop / New Rave



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The Optimist (2010)
01. Lost A Girl
02. Chaos
03. The Optimist
04. Stone
05. We Want To
06. Dolls
07. Before The Light
08. Oh Cherie
09. Rapture
10. Architect Of Love








New Young Pony Club (NYPC) is a four-piece electro band from London, inspired by LCD Soundsystem, provide a kind of tight and bass-heavy future discoid noise.

The band have returned with a triumphant LP which ceremoniously leaves the posturing behind, delivering a freer sound built on an exciting mix of crescendo, space and charm rather than quips clothed in layers of smut. Frontwoman Tahita Bulmer's vocals envelope the sound unafraid, cut loose from their quasi-spoken cage of pretence.

The range on this album is colossal, even though its influences are still more or less paraded; take the title-track's whirling, steam-engine keyboard parts, and the PJ Harvey-recalling sadness on the album's ballad, Stone. But there's far more than mimicry on offer here; colossal key-changes and an audible sense of excitement become the album's revelation.

The Optimist is a super-smart pop album at the top of its game.



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Electronic / Female Vocal / Indie Pop



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Interpreting Masters Vol. 1 (2010)
01. Heard It On The Radio
02. I Can't Go For That
03. Rich Girl
04. Sara Smile
05. Kiss On My List
06. Maneater
07. She's Gone
08. Private Eyes
09. One On One






Inara George and Greg Kurstin, alias the Bird and the Bee, are an army of two. They listen to everything, and answer to no one. They started playing Jazz standards together, and when they were all out of covers, they wrote some songs of their own.

Renowned for their covers, it was pretty much inevitable that someday they'd put out a cover album -- in this case, "Interpreting The Masters Volume 1: A Tribute To Daryl Hall And John Oates." It's pretty much what you'd expect after their past covers: a string of Hall and Oates' hit songs, which have metamorphosed into sensual, delicate electronic pop with angelic vocals.

Inara Geoge has a beautifully flexible voice, which always seems to be wavering between huskiness and sweetness. And she sounds like she's having a lot of fun in this album, adding her own funky feminine flavor to time-honored pop songs -- it ends up sounding like the confessions of a strong-willed girl who's loved fast, hard and passionately, and has sometimes ended up with a heart that's been cracked rather than broken.

Catchy and sweet. (Amazon)