By Todd Lavoie
Neon Neon, “I Lust U (featuring Cate Le Bon)”
As far as concept albums go, it couldn’t get much odder: Neon Neon’s Stainless Style (Lex Records) — the new collaboration between Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys and underground electro/hip hop producer Boom Bip — takes a body-rockin’ trundle on the time-machine back to the heady life and times of John DeLorean, and mercifully, it works and works and works. It could’ve been so completely naff — concept albums often are, frequently falling prey to their own ambition and overly-serious dedication to the subject matter concerned — but the impish Welsh singer/songwriter and L.A. beatmaster handle the conceit with humor, reverence, and more than a little insight as well. Better yet, the album just as successfully when considered merely as a collection of songs, no more, no less. Isolate any of these synth-wigglers from the concept album construct, and you’ll still end up with a solid stand-alone track worthy of your hips and ears.
A neon yellow DeLorean: ready
Stainless Style is steeped a-plenty deep in the Back to The Future era. Much like the infamous DeLorean vehicle itself, the album is slick and sleek, squeaking from a hard polish that lands midway between glitzy and tacky beyond belief — in the best possible way, mind you. Any recording which intends to faithfully, convincingly pay tribute to the 80s must speak with a fluency in the rhythmic- and synth-cheeses of the times, and Neon Neon apparently has taken a full-immersion course in the language.