Saturday 12 July 2008

Album Review: Black Kids - Partie Traumatic


An album full of songs about Reggie Youngbloods (lead singer) attempts at harassing the opposite sex is how the band describe the album and they're not far off. With a synth sound that Zane Lowe describes as "modern disco" it's certainly got a pop feel to it. However, it's the lyrics that really give it a disco and pop feel with the main theme being chasing girls and dancing. "It's Friday night and I ain't got nobody, so what's the use of pulling a shape?" they sing on the great single Hurricane Jane. The great lines don't stop there with the great line in I've Underestimated My Charm (Again) "Like many a Mael, I get angst in my pants. And goddamn it to hell, it don't help if I dance" I've looked up that spelling of Mael and there was a character in The Vampire Chronicles but I'm not sure they're referring to him.

As an album I don't think I would normally be in to Black Kids but the EP they released before (Wizard of Ahhhs) was packed with all the good songs off the album and they were too good to ignore. The album opener Hit The Heartbrakes will surely be the next single and by then they will be BIG. They are touring like mad and have always said that Britain has jumped on to them before anywhere else, even the states are only just getting on to them (mainstream wise anyway). I don't know how much of that is true and how much is just saying what we want to hear but they are certainly getting a lot of radio play here.

As a live band they are very similar to how they interview, their sense of humour is very dry and sometimes you don't know whether they are being serious or not. Recently when asked why they were called the Black Kids, Reggie replied "my Dad was one of the original Black Panthers and he told us black people invented music". The Black Panther Party were a 60's/70's civil rights party, only half the band are black by the way, Reggie and his sister Ali Youngblood (she seems to smile so much as if she's trying to make up for the rest of the band).

Have a listen to the songs below and see what you think, these songs were originally made available free to download on the Wizard of Ahhs EP on their web site around the time I went to see them so I don't feel bad at all making the singles available...

MP3: Hurricane Jane - Black Kids

MP3: I'm not gonna teach your boyfriend how to dance with you - Black Kids

MP3: Hit The Heartbrakes - Black Kids

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very interesting to see how close we all were to putting the same things; I could quite easily have picked 5 from Q Shoes & JAL's selections. Ben Folds/ Air/ Muse/ ESP/ Supergrass were all in my top 20!

Anonymous said...

Booger, wrong post!