El Guapo
Fake French

Dischord brings us another of its delicacies, the fourth work of the eclectic trio from Washington DC, the second for the aforementioned record label. It certainly doesn't put it in a nouvelle cuisine menu, given the album title, Fake French, a name that distinguishes culinary (and other) products made in the USA that imitate well-known typical French products. The sound our friendly friends produce in their album is not exactly francophone, but it certainly has some "European" connotations.
Re-evaluating the definition of "indietronica" in a personal way, I would say that our heroes make electronic music, even of a certain level, constantly looking "back," which means both drawing inspiration from certain synthetic music from the early 1980s (in some parts the resemblance to some old tracks by the Human League from Reproduction is embarrassing) and from a certain minimal new-wave that at the same time began to take hold on our continent (see the Simple Minds of Empire and Dance).

The trio, however, does not stop here and succeeds in the operation that the excellent Liars could not complete, that is to create an almost perfect combination between these old sounds and the new (how new they really are is another matter) "post-punk" injections (in my time "post-punk" meant something else... ah, definitions...).
The songs, where they might otherwise get lost in the flatness of certain drum machine rhythms, magically open up with the live (almost lo-fi) sound of the drums or bass or electric guitar, warming the cold environment generated by the electronic base and the sometimes chanting and overlapping singing of the 3 voices. The vintage sound of laptops and certain digital rhythms (the "clap" effect in Just Don't Know is exceptional) perfectly matches the call and response between the 3 musician-singers (at times screaming) generating a sound between serious and funny, which to me is not so funny after all.
In short, if I had to choose between "are they or do they play it," I would say these El Guapo are there. They could easily be underestimated for certain catchy tracks or lyrics that seem not very serious, but in reality, the 3 know how to use the tools at their disposal well and the lyrics show sagacity as well as subtle sarcasm. They know well what they are feeding us, although they are only "false French."

In conclusion, El Guapo convinces me, despite it being easy to catch them with their hands in the bag marked "80s," just as Interpol convinced me although on different levels, because it's still not a crime to revisit certain (good) music from the past (we should stop listening to music these days) and it's even less so if we consider the mitigating factor of the trio's young age and the fact that they put something of their own, put a lot into it, and do it well.
Recommended.