Sometimes the human mind can play tricks on itself, and it can do it in the most cruel of fashions. It can make you fall in love with someone you shouldn’t for a start. Or when your mate starts making lewd suggestions about your mother, it makes you picture it. Or it can do it’s very best to try and ruin a band for you.
Listening to ‘Donkey,’ the second album from CSS, there was something puzzling me. They sound like someone, I just couldn’t place it. It was only on the penultimate track, ‘Believe, Achieve’ that it struck me. They sound like a more credible version of The Cheeky Girls. Lucky for them, there’s enough to go on here to make me try and get over that.
Those looking for a repeat of their eponymous debut will perhaps only be mildly happy. It’s obvious that it’s CSS, but it’s definitely not a repeat showing. It’s cleaner for a start – with virtually no naughty words and even less on the suggestive lyrics.
‘Jager Yoga’ is an amazing opening track. It has the strong riff, the funky beat and the killer chorus that you, having listened to their first outing, should expect from them. It’s slightly rockier sound, and this is very much a sign of things to come. They’ve hardly dropped their dance edge, but the guitars are definitely more prominent ‘Donkey.’ ‘How I Became Paranoid’ is a spiky electro-pop hit in waiting, and exactly how Neon Neon could have turned out had they not descended in pure parody. It all sounds jolly, but lyrics unveil a broken heart. It’s one of the few times Adriano Cintra’s vocals are used – they always work, but there’s something commendable about them being employed only when necessary.
Some of the themes are darker this time as well. Where before we had jovial piss-takes like ‘Meeting Paris Hilton,’ here we have ‘Rat is Dead (Rage),’ which is a chirpy little number about a woman murdering her abusive partner. It has all the charm and sweetness of CSS, it’s just the subject matter is told inappropriately. And sometimes that’s the most effective way.
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That’s not to say that they haven’t lost their smile, either. This isn’t CSS: The comedown. And even when the lyrics are a little bleak, they’re at pains to keep your feet moving. ‘Let’s Reggae All Night’ is a disco-stomper with the simple lyrics and the funky sound effects. ‘Left Behind’ is the kind of vibrant eighties-pop classic that The Long Blondes should have returned with. It does sound quite cheesy, and many of my mates will tell me that “it’s gay,” but it’s summer now and it’s making me smile a lot.
So this is CSS 2008 – not quite the same, developed as a band, thinking a bit more about what they’re saying, but hopefully having just as much fun. And their live show is still amazing.
This is an album to savour now whilst the weather is hot, because it’s the ultimate get up and go – be it on a night out or a day job seeking. There are a thousand reasons to be cynical about these songs – they’re a bit too disco, the lyrics are only occasionally brilliant and there is a layer of cheese over the whole experience. But fuck that, drop the cynicism and make the most of it before the cold sets in. Having said that, ‘Move’ would definitely get Becky from accounts bopping away at the work Christmas do.
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