Two Lone Swordsmen
Wrong Meeting

Dark-wave in abundance. Rays of skeletal electronica. Flashes and 'screamadelic' trails from the '90s. Dirty basslines, lots of guitars and lots of rock for this latest 'Wrong Meeting'; the latest effort from the British duo Two Lone Swordsmen, Andy Wheatherall and Keith Tenniswood.

It was released quietly, without much fuss or wordplay and surprises if one is not accustomed to Weatherall's eclectic name. Yes, because the dancing season, the more techno, the more electronic one is now a thing of the past, and after the turn of 'From The Double Gone Chapel' and its visceral and sweaty blends of dance and electro-rock, we were already on the right path to grasp the dark and brilliant insights of the evolution and contamination of the sound of the two musical swordsmen. What takes shape is the ''wrong and bastard meeting'' of an infected rock, punk'n'roll with that electro-wave so dear to the eighties.

9 tracks with blinding and metropolitan contours, varied, permanently branded for the first time by many vocal parts that immerse themselves, blending perfectly into the plastic and sound fluids of the two never-forgotten past decades. So it seems we faintly hear the New Order intertwining souls and instruments ('Rattlesnake Daddy') with Iggy Pop's rudeness ('No Girl In My Plan'), that it seems the Cramps are making guitars and basses sob, and that Thurman is dancing and stomping on the carpet ('Evangeline') with those icy eyes and fiery lips in typically Tarantino style...

Wrong Meeting is a clear example of how their polluted rock perfectly marries with any intuition or possible solution, of how past lessons smile on the ''meeting-clash'' with more current sounds and beats, dripping on you like thick paint. Two Lone Swordsmen enchant in these guises, even when they sound so much more crudely electro-pop. Throwing in, in an album with dark but iridescent tones, highly danceable tracks that stick to you from the first listen ('Evangeline', 'No Girl In My Plan'); captivating and obsessive rhythms ('Never More Than Just Enough' and the title track 'Wrong Meeting'); repetitive and fascinating melodies ('Patient Saints' and 'Puritan Fist') hiding and relegating, only at the end of the album, the two languid and melancholic beauties of 'Work At Night' and 'Get Out Of My Kingdom', subtly seductive for their soft nuances and their nocturnal taste.

Okay, we are distant from the 'purer' and more twisted electronica of 'From The Double Gone Chapel', from those perverse and panting basses and the bursts of 'Sex Beat', 'Formiga Fuego' and 'The Lurch' are only blurred echoes, but the pieces of Wrong Meeting shine brightly with their own soul even when they slow down and become less aggressive, letting you enjoy them as echoes of a gray but blinding sky, dragging you down into the boiling and diabolical magma of the slickest new-wave without you even realizing it..

It's the 'Wrong Meeting' I wanted.

4-.With small margins for improvement.