Finally tonight, I thought I'd point out The War Against Silence's review of ZeRo-oNe-INFINITY by Barcelona, since that's one of the CDs that finally arrived yesterday (yay).
The album opens with a square, decisive drum-machine thump, burbling synth textures, bounding sequencer hooks and wiry rhythm guitar, and by the time Jen steps up to the microphone to start the clipped narration of "Studio Hair Gel" I'm ready to discover how New Wave has evolved since "Don't You Want Me?" and "Only You," instead of insisting on trying to deduce it in advance.
... Pop lyrics don't get much geekier than "Paging System Operator" (show me another song with a line as obscure as "I saw your name on a cracker screen / Waiting for EA Winter Games to load"), but the scene that eventually plays out, a thirteen-year-old looking online for a mentor and finding what turns out to be only another thirteen-year-old, is both trenchant and plaintive, and probably far more representative than the usual romanticized melodrama....
