Imperial Teen: Feel the Sound

Label: Merge

It can't be easy, being a fun pop band in times of global tension and fear. Which is why we sit up whenever Imperial Teen gets around to making a new record. Feel the Sound, the SF quartet's first album in about five years, is so fearlessly confident in its melodies and dance-pop rhythms that the notion of escapism never comes to mind. Or, to paraphrase Leonard Bernstein, Feel the Sound is the right response to our dark times: pop that is more intensely fun. "No Matter What You Say" positively effervesces, the band's four-way harmonies calling to mind the way Stereolab songs could seem somehow creamy and lush, nimble and sprightly. "Last to Know" may seem like a Hall & Oates cover for a brief moment, before exploding into technicolor rhythms and melodic nirvana. You'll notice too that on each song, the rhythm section is the entire band. Every instrument, every clipped lyric fits into the song's rhythmic sensibility, each piece complementing the whole. Listen to the way the thumpy-thump that opens "The Hibernates" becomes the maypole around which the vocals, guitar and keyboard all dance, or the smoothness with which "Hanging About" approaches a Krautrock-style chug. It's fun that can and will go as deep as you want it to, and yes, we also quite like the idea that lots of people will be singing along to themes of gay love, among other subjects. We feel this sound -- thanks, Imperial Teen!