I fell in love with Carol van Dyk's voice the firt time I heard Kid's Allright back in '92. The track was from their debut LP Palomine, and that voice - capable of rocking hard, yet at other times so soft and quivering and vulnerable, like (sigh) Chrissie Hynde. The Dutch band plied a mix of indie rock, a love for Neil Young and Velvet Underground riffs, and were going to be the next big thing. It didn't quite play out that way and they parted with label Matador, but have continued to put out records on their own. The last few have shown them unafraid to experiment, getting quieter and adding strings. Their latest is Attagirl, and they continue to play with their sound. This record finds them adding synths and drum machines, and the result has them sounding a bit more pop-tastic. It is only on a couple of the LP's tracks where this is evident, and the rest is the same quality stuff they've been doing for years. Here's Dreamaniacs, a shiny, glossy tune. And ooh, that voice. If you don't feel this new direction, take solace in the fact that the US version of the CD has acoustic versions of these tunes on it. Me, I like the slight shift.
3 comments:
It's sad Bettie Serveert never got very big in the Netherlands. I saw them a few years ago in Amsterdam, and with me were only 10 or 15 other people. The music is still great.
Nice one Michael! the Betties are personal friends of my next door neighbours at work. They studied together (art academy). Last year, at a birthday party) 2 of them came over to play a couple of accoustic songs: surprise act! I also was invited for that party but i couldn't go...
You should also check out the band "Bauer". it's the band of the ex drummer of Bettie Serveert, Berend Dubbe. He does electronic experimentations with lots of samples. His latest album (Baueresque) sounds like a clumsy version of Broadcast and is very enjoyable.
Fons
That's a great story Fons - too bad you couldn't go. I've seen 'em live a bunch of times and they've always been great.
I went to the Bauer site and listened to some of the tracks there, then promptly headed over to the Discogs page and added it to my wantlist! It sounds pretty cool to me...
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