one life stand

[1] Hot Chip, ‘Huarache Lights’

hot-chip-15

2008: [20] Hot Chip, ‘Ready For The Floor’
2000s: [26] Hot Chip, ‘Over And Over’
2010: [8] Hot Chip, ‘One Life Stand’
2012: [6] Hot Chip, ‘Let Me Be Him’

So, basically, Hot Chip have been heading this way. Regular readers of Jukebox Junior (hi Mum!) will know my feelings about Hot Chip – they should be right up my street, but something’s always missing, at least over the course of an album – but I started to feel different this year, mainly down to a cracking Glastonbury set that was a ‘moment’ from start to finish. ‘Huarache Lights’, thumping organic rhythm, cheeky sample later repurposed, nerdy bounce, talkbox, joy of records, everything, was already my single of the year; the gig just made sure.

Junior? “It’s a bit boring.”

[8] Hot Chip, ‘One Life Stand’

Hot Chip

Because I have notes I know Junior said, “It’s beautiful, his voice sounds good,” and really, does anything need to be added to that?

Yes. I get paid by the word. Well, I don’t, but it’s worth maintaining standards just in case. Hot Chip would do well to remember that ethos and then they wouldn’t be thought of (by me) as the archetypal “occasionally good singles” band. I find nothing engaging about their albums and am frustrated by their inability to be the modern flamekeepers for the kind of cerebral synthpop I’ve always loved – they bear some of the chops, but rarely connect with the killer choruses I expect. When they do – ‘Over And Over’, ‘Ready For The Floor’, this – they devastate. ‘One Life Stand’ withholds the transcendent hook, so when it hits it hits hard. In the end, nuzzled by comic synth drama, it’s generous and, yeah, beautiful.