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Underground > Radio & Music >

The Faint: Danse Macabre

Regrettable Juvenilia

08:54 / 01.05.03

Release the electrobats!

Picked up Danse Macabre by The Faint t'other day, on the recommendation of various people of taste. It's pretty much exactly the kind of stuff I'm into at the moment - a genre of music I hope will come to be called nihilist disco (hey, it's better than e******c**sh, right?). Essentially, The Faint sound like Ladytron's pissed-off, more aggressive big brother. If they were a person, they'd be a boy in black jeans and a skinny-fit black-t-shirt, with floppy black fringe, lots of eyeliner, a scowl and a battered Camus paperback tucked under one arm. But in a good way - that boy could dance as well.

I have a feeling that this is what I hoped Interpol would sound like when I first read positive reviews of their stuff (which in practice bores me). Bit of a Joy Division influence, sure (I can hardly believe they're from Nebraska in places, the sound is so suggestive of rainy, most probably Northern British towns), but that's tempered by the influence of more upbeat, flamoboyant 80s synth groups (yes, there really is a Duran Duran influence) and the way the arrangement/production means that most of it actually makes you want to dance. This also compensates from the moments when the band teeter on the edge of ridiculousness - when the endless misanthropy and melodramatics become Too Goth, rather than Exactly Goth Enough. Eg, all that 'ALL WE WANT IS PRETTY LITTLE HOMES' stuff on 'Agenda Suicide' would possibly be a bit too much if it wasn't such a storming, stomping tune...

Any other fans? I have this weird half-memory someone once told me The Faint were rubbish posers long before I heard their stuff - was it you, and if so, why?

14:51 / 01.05.03

It could have been me.

I've seen them play twice now, and have been thoroughly entertained by their shenanigans on both occasions, but..

They're still essentially an ironic joke band, right?

I mean - strobe lights, asburdly precarious barnets, Gary Numan make-up, leather trousers, those silly synth-guitar thingys, songs called things like 'Suicide Arcade' - it's all a good laff, but I still maintain that 80s retro-futurism is emphatically NOT the future of music.. (or at least if it is, I'm getting into architecture instead).

I'm afraid they have the same appeal to me as Marilyn Manson and Andrew WK - silly, bambastic joke music.

Sorry for being all grumpy, but that'swhatithinks.

I'll end by quoting Everett True's review of The Faint; "Some hipsters out there are so jaded they think it would be fun to start a Flock of Seagulls revival. IT ISN'T."

Matthew Fluxington

15:24 / 01.05.03

I like one of their songs, "Agenda Suicide," but it sort of sounds like a lo-fi NIN/Marilyn Manson to my ears. I'm starting to think that you are a closet industrial fan, Flyboy. You can call it 'nihilist disco', but isn't that just a euphemism for goth industrial?

I think a lot of my bias against the Faint is their tangental connection to Conor Oberst.

Red Cross Iodized Salt

05:12 / 02.05.03

There's some nice punky lo-fi disco coming out of Brooklyn these days. Not sure if they've been talked about on these pages before (or indeed if it has become fashionable to slag them off yet), but the Death From Above producers have put out a handful of quality reckids on their new label over the last year.

On a side note: they're still letting Everett 'The Legend!' True write about music?

05:25 / 02.05.03

That's one of my favorites CD's of the year. It makes me dance my ass off. Ladytron is like the Faint with girl vocals. Both make you dance.

05:36 / 02.05.03

Just saw these guys live tonight and they were fantastic!

06:08 / 02.05.03

What were they like? I'm seeing them next Thursday in DC.

09:49 / 02.05.03

Regarding The Faint's obvious 70's/80's influences: Ladytron once pinned the sleeve of a Gary Numan album to the studio wall as an indicator of which direction not to go in!

11:15 / 02.05.03

Yeah, but they still sound like early Depeche Mode...

I have just been out and got this Faint record on Fly's recommendation in this thread, and it's so good... right up my street anyway, but it's very well done. I love the histrionic New Romantic vox. This is what Romo should have been like.

Regrettable Juvenilia

11:31 / 02.05.03

That's it, that's exactly what everyone from Scissor Sisters to Ladytron and The Faint are: RoMo done right! I'm glad I'm not the only person who knows what that means...

14:00 / 02.05.03

Jack, the sound was great. It actually sounded like CD quality. They played with electicity and sex appeal. And when they started playing worked so sexual the crowed exploded into a massive dance orgy.

14:08 / 02.05.03

Waheeyyyy!

An ex-girlfriend of mine turned me on to the Faint. Actually, more accurately, when I was first trying to woo her she mentioned that it was her favourite band and so I downloaded a bunch of it so I'd have something to talk to her about next time. I never really listened to it and about 5 months ago, when sorting through my mp3 archive, came across it and finally gave it a listen. Lo and behold I really enjoy the Faint now, but she and I have long since broken up.

I like their earlier album, Blank Wave Arcade, much more than Danse Macabre. Get it!

And Flux, come on, they're nothing like Marilyn Manson or NIN.

Matthew Fluxington

14:14 / 02.05.03

If it means anything to you, I didn't mean that they sounded like NIN in a bad way.

They still have the stink of Oberst all over them.

16:15 / 02.05.03

But Oberst stinks so good.

20:37 / 02.05.03

There's always going to be a market for a retro sound although I'd disagree with Ladytron being lumped into that category which is pretty much why I like them (give me a Depeche Mode album and I'll.... give it back).

So the point I guess is do we need bands or artists rehashing a sound we can get from 'x' number of original 80's acts in the first place? Surely the best approach would be to say: we've done that - now we move forward.

Matthew Fluxington

21:25 / 02.05.03

Though I always admire the original and the foward-thinking, I think that there is quite a lot to be said for tradition, and I think it is interesting that so many people who grew up in the 80s are interested in exploring an electro-pop tradition. Electro-pop is a valid genre, and I think that it is unfair to label these current groups "retro" when the same sort of thinking is not applied to say, folk music. Or rock and roll. Or country-western. Or gospel. You get what I'm saying?

08:18 / 03.05.03

Flux, I hope you were being sarcastic about the stink of Oberst. I can never tell.

And I second the Blank-Wave Arcade recommendation wholeheartedly.

But I wonder, has anyone else bought Media, their first album, and begun to wonder if it's really all so ironic? There is a lot more...well, it's just a lot more earnest. And though it may be a naive stand to take, I like the Faint on a non-ironic level, because I am sick to fucking death of irony=hip. It's not cool, these days, to actually care about much of anything, from what I gather. Must be smug and detached. And if that's really the point of the Faint, I'm sorry, but I'm totally missing it. And maybe on purpose. Yes, it's overblown; yes, once in awhile they should lay off the damn vocoder (Chunklet's Band-a-Minute snark has never been more true). Does it really sound like the 80s? I don't think so. Tell me why.

I always think of a friend of mine calling track two on Danse Macabre "the feel-good hit of the summer." Can't we just like things for what they are anymore?

Done whining. Sorry, I went to a show tonight where I loved the band, but the female singer was wearing white jeans and a white blazer. Hello, Don Johnson. Make it stop. Please.

21:59 / 03.05.03

I've not heard them, but two things:

While I'll let Flux do it himself: no, no he's not being sarcastic about Oberst.

Maybe they're not ironic, maybe they're just playing their funnny synthy-guitary thingies and having a light show because they saw other people do it. Maybe they really love it. However, I'd imagine even under those circumstances it'd be a bit knowing and a bit "Oh! How I love my 80s goth fashion! Look at me- it's like I'm miserable!". Nothing wrong with that, but it's still a bit easy to criticise.

I should listen to this before I actually open my mouth again, shouldn't I?

02:05 / 06.05.03

There's an album of remixes from Danse Macabre either coming out or out already. More info here.

09:24 / 06.05.03

and I think that it is unfair to label these current groups "retro" when the same sort of thinking is not applied to say, folk music. Or rock and roll. Or country-western. Or gospel. You get what I'm saying?

Good point. After a brief scrunity of the aesthetics of some of the rock bands I like at the moment, I humbly withdraw my argument and replace it with "I just think the Faint are annoying, I suppose".

Regrettable Juvenilia

16:58 / 07.05.03

straylight rocks. That's pretty much what I wanted to say, in regards to the issue of whether The Faint are an 'ironic' (argh, what an awful word that is these days, shame on you Riz) or 'joke' band - I don't hear it, personally*. A bit of humour, but only as much is necessary to balance what would otherwise be po-faced gloom. It's all well and good to say that you don't like that futurist, New Romantic sound, but I think you have to accept that The Faint *do* - they really love it, it's not a pose. I think 'Ballad Of A Paralysed Citizen' really shows that they're not taking the piss - it's got that very black humour but it's entirely smirk-free. And it really reminds me of J.G.Ballard, much as 'Violent' sounds like the perfect soundtrack to Sprawl-era William Gibson... (If that's not too pretentious.)

Track 2 on Danse Macabre is 'Glass Danse' - can definitely see how that could be a song for this summer. Isn't there a whole sub-genre of songs that diss dance clubs but are essentially dance tunes? Hmmm...

*Of course, I use the same argument to claim that the YYYeahs aren't smug or retro or ironic, which is where straylight and I part ways, so go figure...

17:49 / 08.05.03

I'm going to see them on Monday. I like their music a lot, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't partly looking forward to going for the purpose of dancing a whole lot and checking out everybody's clothes. Sorry. I feel kind of ephemeral about their music, like I'm not sure I'm still going to be listening to it 5 years from now.

I also, for being an unregenerate diehard Elliott Smith fan, get recommended Bright Eyes all the time, so maybe I just have bad taste.