March 19, 2008

The Last Shadow Puppets

The Age Of The Understatement

Photo Gallery: The Last Shadow Puppets

Not only is The Rascals’ recent output very good, theirs is also the only act to take up the stylistic torch offered by ‘Favourite Worst Nightmare’ and really run with it. So to put this collaboration between Rascal Miles Kane and Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner on and hear their voices blend into ‘Please Please Me’-style harmonies and notice how it cribs equally from both of their melodic styles, well, you suspect that Mr Turner has finally met his McCartney. Whatever, the pair are definitely courting right now, and in a whirlwind way.

Their first date is a Morricone Island rollercoaster that gallops into strings, strings and more strings. Strings like they just don’t make anymore, pitched halfway between spaghetti western and ’60s spy flick. Occasionally James Ford’s drums will leap in like he’s shooting injuns off the back of the wagon, then the whole thing will twist on its axis – a stab of viola here, a twang of Shadows guitar there. Into this cinematic brew dives Alex Turner’s peculiar way with words: “There’s affection to rent… Before the attraction ferments/Kiss me properly and pull me apart”. His syllables twist and turn with cadences all of their own. ‘…Understatement’ lies balanced between the unreachable glamour of a bygone age and the very modern flinty melodies of its authors. Unite the two and you’ve got something that’ll have you laughing at the sheer audacity of its vision – it’s so bold it’s a joke. It even began as a joke – two buddies in search of a collaboration, kidding about being Burt Bacharach, being the guy in the polo neck with curls of smoke rising from the ashtray on the grand piano. That we live in an age when our stars are prepared to take a gamble on such fanciful notions is great. That they thoroughly succeed is fantastically fantastic.

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