Album Reviews

Album Review: OMD – History Of Modern (100% Records)

By | Published on Thursday 26 August 2010

OMD

Given the last few years’ electronic pop resurgence, it’s feels right that one of that genre’s pioneers should resurface for their first album in 14 years.

In fact, it’s also their first featuring the original line up of Paul Humphreys and Andy McCluskey since 1986’s ‘The Pacific Age’, although sonically ‘HOM’ has much in common with the fizzy synth pop of McCluskey’s early 90s OMD output, whilst under-rated single ‘If You Want It’ bears more than a passing resemblance to 1996’s ‘Walking On The Milky Way’, though it’s arguably an even better song.

Some of these tracks have been dug out of the OMD vaults, whilst newer creations tap into the group’s history of wistful melancholia and toytown futurism. And so, the brutally insistent Simon Cowell-baiting opener ‘New Babies: New Toys’ has nods to ‘The New Stone Age’ (and it could teach The Killers a thing or two about compelling, pulsating synth rock). Ludicrously catchy ‘Sister Marie Says’ is a close relative of ‘Enola Gay’ (hardly surprising since both tracks were written 30 years ago), whilst the lush waltz ‘Bondage Of Fate’ recalls the dreamy desolation of ‘International’. Meanwhile, the two title tracks (that’s ‘Parts 1’ and ‘2’ if you’re confused) are genuinely up there (no, really) with the duo’s early 80s classics – the affecting vocals, interesting lyrics and devastatingly simple but wonderfully pretty synth riffs harking back to ‘Souvenir’, ‘Electricity’, ‘Tesla Girls’ et al.

It’s not a faultless collection (the Kraftwerk tribute ‘RFWK’ is well-intentioned but just sounds clunky and laboured, whilst listening to ‘Pulse’ is like phoning a sex line to be greeted with Andy McCluskey with bad cold), and purists will moan at the lack of a Humphreys vocal or the absence of the experimental side of the group that gave us the inexplicably brilliant ‘Dazzle Ships’, but OMD don’t really need to prove anything. Simply put, this is a collection of memorable electro-pop (with a few heavenly moments) that ranks as one of their best albums. MS

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