One of the things I love about the actress Katherine Hepburn is that she made being intelligent seem sexy. Not that I’m claiming to be particularly intelligent, or even sexy for that matter. You’d have to ask my wife on both counts.
My point (not strictly essential but it’s a starting…erm) is that there are few pop acts out there who manage to combine these two attributes, assuming that you subscribe to the notion of intelligence and rock ‘n’ roll being on occasion suitable bed-fellows: you know, like “spontaneity has its time and its place”.*
I mean Steely Dan strike me as intelligent chaps but I’ve never felt compelled to cry out “Woah! Steady ladies!” when a picture of Donald Fagen or Walter Becker has appeared in some music magazine. Bowie probably fits the bill as do Franz Ferdinand but what about the women of rock ‘n’ roll? PJ Harvey? Kate Bush?
Or how about MONADE front woman Laetitia Sadier?
Better known for her work in Stereolab, Sadier’s side-project was initially just her multi-instrumental self, as the debut ‘Socialisme Ou Barbarie (The Bedroom Recordings)’ testifies. On her follow-up ‘A Few Steps More’ she’s filled out her compositions with a full band. Ultimately this brings the sound closer to Stereolab but without the same degree of opaque pop sensibility.
Equally louche and languid, dripping with Jazz chords, prog-rock tempo changes and alt-rock arrangements of the Tortoise variety, ‘A Few Steps More’ is very French like a Cartier-Bresson photograph, a Colette novel or a Godard film. Sporadically interesting but rarely invigorating the album flits inconsistently from essential to inconsequential and back again, sometimes in the same song. Despite its obvious failings it never refuses to loosen its slight grip but nonetheless rarely quickens the pulse.
Sadier’s ‘gamine matron’ vocals are limited in range yet her mannered and “posh” French phrasing is ideally suited to the music. Opening track ‘Wash and Dance’ is perhaps the most frenetic offering suggesting the band may have broken into a sweat during its recording. The initial instrumental section of the title track sounds as if Air has shared the stage with Pink Floyd circa 1967: it’s an image that recurs throughout the album. ‘Das Kind’ is dull. Serves her right for switching to German.
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‘2 Portes, 7 Fenetres’ (ah bon, le francais encore!) personifies the split-personality of the album, starting out as a plodding dirge and then breaking out into a quasi-psychedelic tonal funk work-out: not dance-floor funky just slight head-nodding funky to work those neck muscles. ‘Pas Toujours, Encore’ briefly threatens a notion of boundless euphoria but manages to reign itself in before anyone noticed the musical manifesto being shifted too far from art to he-art.
Digression: does anyone out there remember Vic and Bob’s ‘Action! Image! Exchange!’? This is the music they’d play.
The guitar on ‘Sensible et Extensible’ recalls a lighter Throwing Muses and has a mid-section that is decidedly pop with the girly vocal segment reminiscent of Vanessa Paradis singing ‘Joe le Taxi’. ‘Paradoxale’ (or as I call it, ‘the straight song’) provides a welcome change by not changing at any time during its 3 and a half minutes. Zut alors! Trés paradoxale, enfin!
Admirably single-minded but frustratingly blinkered at the same time, Sadier exudes talent but rarely registers her music in the mind long enough for that talent to stay memorable. With her agenda, whatever it may be, she seems defiantly predisposed to displaying her intellectual credentials through music rather than her soul, occasionally managing to capture your imagination but never your heart.
Thus, in unsurprising conclusion: intelligent, yes; sexy, no.
* From the Rob Reiner/John Cusack film ‘The Sure Thing’ fact fans
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