Having seduced the saturated J-pop market in Japan with their plastic-wrapped homogeneous pop-by-numbers formula, The Pipettes have set their sights higher and are now poised to take on the World… However, assembling an album merely by twiddling the knobs 2 settings to the left of the pre-loaded, Casio Pop Creator sample-pack default, is not going to make this an easy proposition. ‘Earth Vs. The Pipettes’ struggles laboriously to unite the Sounds of Now; lacking the sparklingly joyous, indulgent pop energy of Alphabeat or the glossy electro-punk synth-porn of La Roux and MGMT, “Vs.” attempts to straddle the two genres but finds very little purchase in either, slipping regrettably into a middling limbo somewhere betwixt. Tepid, wishy-washy generic-pop in the Sophie Ellis Bextor mode.
Fitting snugly alongside the likes of Florence & The Machine, Victoria & Jacob and La Roux; School of Seven Bells’ second album includes some smartly crafted 80′s electro-pop. Opening with the lead single ‘Windstorm’ (which is reminiscent of Coco Rosie’s ‘Rainbow Warriors’) the tone is set for a sometimes fruitful blend of pop sophistication. This is taken a step further with the superior ‘Dust Devil’, which intertwines thrusting, layered vocals with 1980s drama / danger pop grandeur. ‘ILU‘ follows, with all the hallmarks of a classic pop single. Both sweet and melancholy, this is very respectable stuff and is among the real highlights of ‘Disconnect From Desire’. School Of Seven Bells seem to have tapped into a section of the late 80′s / early 90′s, with ‘Heart is Strange’, the excellent ‘Dial’ and the rather unfortunately titled ‘Babelonia’ . The flat, haunting harmonies of the twins also work especially well on the minimalist, David Bowie Scary Monsters-phase ‘Camarilla’. When peaking, classic acts like St. Etienne or The Cocteau Twins come to mind. But less inventive than, say, the Fever Ray debut of last year, it’s the over-reliance on Stock, Aitken & Waterman style drum machine and 80′s lacquer that is keeping School Of Seven Bells downstream.
