Cripes! Karen’s teamed up with Danger Mouse
KAREN O AND DANGER MOUSE: Lux Prima (BMG) Verdict: Unlikely duo deliver in style SLEEPER: The Modern Age (Gorsky) Verdict: Britpop pioneers rejuvenated
As THE wild-eyed frontwoman of New York indie-rock trio the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Karen O was a formidable presence in the Noughties.
sporting futuristic space costumes, she was a daring, sometimes reckless performer who once ended up in hospital after tumbling off the stage.
But the singer, born Karen Orzolek to a Polish father and Korean mother, has a softer side — and it’s the more nuanced aspects of her character that come to the fore on this engaging link-up with Grammy-winning musician Brian Burton, otherwise known as Danger Mouse.
New Yorker Burton, 41, has worked with Gorillaz and U2, but he’s best known as a member of the charttopping dance duo Gnarls Barkley.
His partnership with Orzolek, an art-rocker who is more accustomed to ear- splitting power- chords, is certainly improbable.
But the duo, whose friendship dates back to an inebriated phone call made by Karen ten years ago, pull off an unexpected triumph on Lux Prima.
They wrote all the songs together, and Burton’s lush strings and synths provide Orzolek with a perfect platform to branch out. she grabs the opportunity in style, surrendering to her dreamier instincts without discarding the passionate vocal yelps of old.
Lux Prima is bookended by its nine- minute title track and the closing Nox Lumina, two languid and cinematic pieces. The title track, built around old- school synths and electric piano, is initially a showcase for Danger Mouse, with Karen’s voice absent. But the singer, 40, soon makes her presence felt.
On Ministry, she’s on surprisingly poetic form as she implores a lover to ‘ cast my heart anew’. Reveries is an acoustic torch song in the theatrical style of the Belgian singer- songwriter Jacques Brel.
Burton’s eagerness to create a mood occasionally eclipses the pair’s ability to craft tight tunes. But they get the balance right more often than not, with Leopard’s Tongue finding Karen slipping into a breathless soprano as Burton supplies funky grooves that hark back to Crazy, the Gnarls Barkley single he made with CeeLo Green.
Old habits die hard for Orzolek, too. Balancing a solo career with motherhood and her day-job in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, she rolls back the years on stylish girlgroup homage Woman and the supple dance track Redeemer. ‘You’re not coming for me, I’m coming for you,’ she insists. With her new musical partner, she’s doing just that.
IF KAREN O remains a leading light in American rock, then Louise Wener was one of Britpop’s foremost female stars.
Her band sleeper toured with Blur and made three top-five albums, but the spotlight shone so brightly on her star quality that the three boys in her band were disparagingly known as sleeperblokes.
As Britpop faded, so did sleeper. They split in 1998, with Wener becoming a successful novelist and moving from London to Brighton with her husband Andy MacLure and their two children.
Now she’s reassembled the sleeperblokes (drummer MacLure among them) for a timely return.
The Modern Age was going to revisit songs the band were working on before they split. But after some well-received festival shows, they started afresh, adding a contemporary sheen. With original producer stephen street back on board, however, a crunchy Britpop bounce remains. HALF- SUNG and halfspoken, Paradise Waiting opens the album by reviving the taut, angular styles of the Nineties. With its jangling guitars and keyboards, More Than I Do looks back even further to Eighties indie-pop.
But Wener, 52, also sings about the joys of motherhood, the ills of social media and coping with loss.
On Car Into The sea, inspired by their 2017 comeback tour, she even breathes a sigh of relief at sleeper’s enduring appeal. It seems a little Cool Britannia still goes a long way.
Both albums are out now. Sleeper’s tour continues tonight at Riverside Newcastle (seetickets.com).