If you want to kick off a project with a single that hooks people in, you need steps that deftly move between an array of sonic sweet spots, linking all manner of sounds and styles, oozing promise, infectiousness, and textural grace… this is how you do it. Take note, people!
This first single from My Clever Android, a city-spanning and well-seasoned pop-rock trio, does all of that, and I’m not even happy with such a reductionist phrase as pop-rock. Yes, it gets the job done, indicates a ballpark, but in this case it is a bit like saying Michelangelo was a painter and decorator who was pretty good with ceilings.
‘Elevator,’ which also acts as a taste of an album to come, does that rare thing of making music at a place where so many great sounds converge – pop contagion and rock energy, slick, chiming psychedelia and groovesome indie, nostalgic gloss and forward-thinking sonics, comfort zones and high adventure. And if pop is this, and it is, at least in part, then it is the sort of pop that almost feels too good for modern mainstream tastes. Perhaps it will act as a sort of Trojan Horse, smuggling itself past the gatekeepers and guardians and reminding people of just how good things were in the pop playpen, and how good they can be again.
But what else would you expect from a bunch of music makers whose collective resumes boast everyone from Seal to Bryan Ferry and from Beyoncé to Bowie?
