Crazy P - Walk Dance Talk Sing

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  • Let's be clear: on Walk Dance Talk Sing, musical boundaries remain unbroken, chins remain unstroked and there's absolutely no chance of Marcel Dettmann dropping any of this at Berghain. But then none of that has ever been the point of Crazy P, and while there's nothing surprising about the Nottingham band's seventh LP, there's nothing disappointing about it either, particularly if you want Jim Baron, Danielle Moore and Chris Todd to turn out another album of pure party music, as they do every few years. Thus, saying that pretty much any of the tracks here could easily also have appeared on any Crazy P album since they dropped the "enis" for 2005's Last Night On Earth is more recommendation than criticism. Once again, this is an album that in some ways sounds as glamorous as Studio 54, yet also has an earthiness that makes it an unpretentious laugh. The ticklish basslines, wah-wah guitars, springing pianos, anthemic choruses and tighter-than-lycra drums in tracks like "Scrap The Book," "The Come On" and "Hear My Song" are Crazy P at their best. There may be something of an '80s soul and electro-pop influence creeping in here: "Echo" is as high-gloss as Chromeo, but with the tongue thankfully removed from the cheek, while "Magnetise" could be a Jellybean Benitez remix of Madonna in her prime. But it's not all music for pirouetting on the dancefloor or pouting into a mirror—"Something More" is a looser, guitar-driven groove, while the pianos turn more plaintive than pounding for heartbroken ballad "The Way." Still, much of Walk Dance Talk Sing has clearly been produced to give Crazy P more show-stopping ammunition for their live gigs, which they've taken to stages as big as Glastonbury and as intimate as The Garden Festival. Indeed, if you want a perfect example of the Adriatic style discussed in The Garden Festival's RA Exchange, "Cruel Mistress" is it. Of course, plenty of artists churn out records that are basically fodder for their DJ sets, but while that often fails to capture the atmosphere of the club, Crazy P do a good job of recreating what it's like to catch them live. That's largely due to Moore's vocals—like Alice Russell, she has just the right amount of grit and grain in her voice to make Crazy P's music more than nu-disco, of which there's hardly a shortage. You could say there's no shortage of Crazy P albums either, but Walk Dance Talk Sing shows you can't have too much of a good thing.
  • Tracklist
      01. Like A Fool 02. The Come On 03. Echo 04. Cruel Mistress 05. Magnetise 06. Something More 07. Walk Dance Talk Sing 08. Scrap The Book 09. The Way 10. Hear My Song 11. Witch Doctor
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