When CMU reviewer Marc Samuels tells me that Chromeo's 'Fancy Footwork' is the best electronic pop album of the year, you won't find me arguing. If there's one thing Samuels knows, it's his way around electronic pop. Don't even think about challenging Marc to an electro-pop trivia quiz, because you don't stand a chance. Actually, Marc made his Chromeo statement two months ago, so he used the phrase "possibly the best electronic pop album of the year", presumably keen to cover his back in case the genre unleashed another stormer in the closing weeks of the year. But no better album has landed on my desk since, so I've dropped the "probably" from the statement, and formerly made 'Fancy Footwork' one of CMU's albums of 2007. And what an album. The follow up to 2004's 'She's In Control', P-Thugg (aka Patrick Gemayel) and Dave 1 (aka David Macklovitch) had a hard act to follow with album number two, but they delivered the goods and then some - tracks that tick all kinds of electro boxes, an album that was simultaneously sleek, shiny, soulful, tight, funky, shimmering, and all kinds of other adjectives I can't think of just now. And then there was the great Dire Straits referencing video to 'Bonafide Lovin' that was the icing on the cake. We've got a phone con with the boys in the diary and will be posting an interview at the below URL soon. Meantime, if you haven't done so yet, go track down 'Fancy Footwork', our fourth album of 2007.
http://www.cmumusicnetwork.co.uk/albumsoftheyear