Art Brut
It's A Bit Complicated

THE REVIEW

At this rate, we might announce the birth of a new genre: Brut Pop.

 It often happens when you're not quite sure how to label a band. And, damn, it's a great sign when a group isn't easily categorized. It signifies personality and artistic originality, qualities that are very, very rare nowadays.

 Art Brut, then: a band of irresistible goofballs, also greatly appreciated by a good number of excellent fans (including Liam Gallagher and Daniel Radcliffe), who in a musical landscape like the British one (which risks flattening out like a thin slice more and more every day) is trying to create a style, an identity, a way to be recognized after just a few notes. And damn, they're succeeding.

 Eddie Argos, the band's leader, approaches the pieces in a conversational tone, practically spoken, with a marked "cockney" accent. This has become a distinctive feature of the English group. What's more evident in the new album compared to the acclaimed debut "Bang Bang Rock 'n Roll" is a more pronounced, "thicker" sound, also super enriched by a flood of new influences, all coming from the fertile land of Albion.

 While the decent debut was jerky but sparse and essential, this seems a more "polished" and curated work, right from a composed (despite the "subject" dealt with, that is the interruption of an amorous moment to turn up the stereo volume) "Pump Up The Volume", which seems to come from something by post-Bernard Butler Suede. It is followed by "Direct Hit" (soundtrack for "Fifa 2008"), the second single from the album: absolutely fantastic. The guitar layer is fantastic (Art Brut is advantaged by using two guitarists, a great choice sound-wise) and super rhythmic, and the choruses serve as excellent enrichment. Certainly a dancefloor filler, at least in the U.K..

 "St. Pauli" is perhaps the track that most recalls the recent British invasion, Kaiser Chiefs/Franz Ferdinand side; the chorus in German is irresistible ("punk-rock ist nicht tot").

It continues in a whirling melting pot composed of the most diverse influences, from a "People In Love" that recalls the style of the debut album to the bouncing "Late Sunday Evening" (which contains a brief trumpet solo!), from the initial electric splurges of "I Will Survive" to the splendid first single "Nag Nag Nag Nag", passing through a weak "Sound Of Summer" and the more classic Britpop of "Blame It On The Trains". The closure with "Jealous Guy" is in the same tones as the rest of the album.

 Eddie Argos: "I'm not an intellectual, I'm just an idiot! I believe you consider me much more intelligent than I actually am."

 Do we want to disagree?