Passive Me, Aggressive You

Was it Morrissey who said “talent borrows, genius steals”? Probably nicked it off Wilde. In any case, it’s tempting to tag The Naked And Famous as 2011’s new musical Einsteins. By now you will have heard of them, heard the gushing praise in the press, and likely, all those MGMT comparisons. And if you start with those first singles you’ll immediately recognise the pop formula, that big synth sound set to conquer every summer festival they play.
To put it bluntly, ‘Young Blood’ is essentially Passion Pit’s ‘Sleepyhead’ and ‘Punching In A Dream’ picks up where the pre-Congratulations MGMT left off. Dreamy electro-pop to be sure, but fairly derivative with it. Better then to start (as logic would dictate) with album opener ‘All Of This’. With its softly cooed boy-girl vocals from Thom Powers and Alisa Xayalith and stunted, understated chorus, it highlights a mature lightness of touch at work. This trend continues throughout.
As the title so succinctly suggests, Passive Me, Aggressive You is all about dynamics. Be it in the joint-gender vocals or the abrupt switches between moody electronica and hard-edged rock, the New Zealand five-piece know how to use contrasts to their advantage. One moment they’re coming over like The xx’s more precocious, less cool Southern hemisphere cousins, the next they’re employing lacerating sheets of guitar straight out of the Trent Reznor chord book. It also helps that each new mask they try on comes with an indelible melody. There are 13 tracks here, and not a dud amongst them. ‘The Sun’ positively throbs, ‘A Wolf In Geek’s Clothing’ employs a good ol’ QOTSA chug and ‘Girls Like You’ ends things on a hook-laden high note. Still the sum of their influences for now, yes, but they are impressively varied influences. And most importantly, it all adds up to a wonderful debut. More to this lot than initially meets the ear, they could, and should, be huge.