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It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single woman in possession of a good record player, must be in want of a perfect pop record to sing into her bathroom mirror to. And there, on a big, shiny white steed of pop, arrives Ladyhawke – saviour of sass, indelible pop hooks and womankind. Well, this may be a little optimistic, but in the age of a dance-blog-a-minute, indie X-Factor and bands being little more than a Facebook group and American Apparel posturing; it’s so rare to find a sound that unites the Hoxton purveyors of daft, slitted sunglasses and the everything-I–like-about-music-I-learnt-on-T4 masses.
With big, brash, shiny choruses and irresistible female vocals, ‘Ladyhawke’ is a gem of the instantly accessible but never irritating. It welds indie sensibilities with dance-floor readiness using the finest in sonic platinum, never once getting lost in self-congratulatory irony that could be so easily at hand to an artist who owes so much of what she does to Cyndi Lauper et al. Opening with the dark, enigmatic epic horizons of ‘Magic’, she proves that pop hath no glory like that from a woman scorned.
However, by no means is this a collection of flimsy sisterhood nonsense: house influences lurk in the shadow of glistening synths to create a metrically handclapping sound that’s both complex and FM-baitingly simple. ‘Better Than Sunday’ is a sultry robotic wink of irresistible pop fervour: at once toying with Kylie bubblegum innocence and femme fatale siren-call. ‘Back of the Van’ plumps the shoulder pads of the already eighties coutured record; opening with stadium filling Eurthymics-esque synth teasingly nonchalant cries of “You set me on Fire!”
And with that, the torch paper is ignited. If, as the lady herself says of Paris; “I’d never had proper champagne before; I’d just had cheap, crappy sparkling wine,” the single ‘Paris is Burning’ is a heady cocktail of gloriously accessible Lambrini with the style of a vintage Bollinger. Superbly crafted, mature and classy; she sprinkles it with gold-dust into an easily digested nectar for the masses.
