You don't need a degree in applied mathematics to unravel their formula. In Katie White, they boast a frontwoman so pretty you feel like giving her a round of applause just for existing. In That's Not My Name, they have a song of such catchiness the World Health Organisation is currently preparing a report on how it can be contained. It's a dead ringer for Toni Basil's effervescent 1982 novelty hit Mickey, borrowing its guitar riff if not, alas, its sense of gleeful subversion. Beneath Mickey's wholesome cheerleader-themed video lurked a song apparently about a woman trying to "turn" a gay man by offering him anal sex, subject matter that makes That's Not My Name's tale of music industry indifference to White's previous outfit, pop trio Dear Eskiimo, seem strangely decorous, however snarling her vocal.
The beautiful-girl-sings-catchy-pop-song formula may be simple to crack, but it's hard to repeat: choruses as contagious as That's Not My Name's gobby playground chant don't come along that often. Impressively, the Ting Tings managed to do it with their first three singles, which also form the opening tracks of their debut album. Fruit Machine boasts a similar effortless sassiness to their current hit, but Great DJ is even better. Like New Order's True Faith and Björk's Big Time Sensuality, it captures the dizzy transcendence of chemically enhanced dancefloor euphoria. The chorus, with its breathless vocal attempts to imitate the sounds on a dance track - "the strings - eee-eee-eee!" - and its blank-eyed chant of "the drums, the drums" sounds both hugely excited and slightly vacant, and, as anyone who's ever spent the early hours of Sunday morning in front of the big speakers with pupils like serving plates can attest, hugely excited and slightly vacant is pretty much the size of it.
But the problems set in when the first three tracks have drawn to a close. Driven by Jules De Martino's booming drums, the rest of We Started Nothing clings to fizzy, new-wave pop for inspiration: a bit of disco-era Blondie on Shut Up and Let Me Go, a touch of Talking Heads on Impacilla Carpisung. There's nothing wrong with that: criticising an album called We Started Nothing for being unoriginal seems a bit like complaining that Public Image Limited's This Is Not a Love Song isn't a love song. But after achieving a perfect strike rate on their singles, the Ting Tings' admirable quest for glossy, depthless pop perfection keeps coming up short. Keep Your Head and We Walk prove White and De Martino can do glossy and depthless at will, but pop perfection comes less easily. As a result, We Started Nothing sounds like a collection of early 1980s novelty hits, with all the qualitative issues that entails: for every Mickey or Echo Beach, there's an I Eat Cannibals and a Shaddap You Face.
In fairness, there's nothing genuinely terrible here - Traffic Light's vaguely jazzy balladry is pretty, the title track's blend of two-chord garage churn and funk horns is pretty good - but equally, there's nothing that doesn't sound a bit pallid when compared with the singles. With no songwriting as powerful as Great DJ or That's Not My Name to hold you, attention gets drawn to their flaws, not least White's agonizing habit of dropping into Estuary-accented gorblimey. At one point she starts going on about having something she calls an opportuni-ee. Given that White comes from Wigan, this does stretch the bounds of creduli-ee, and indeed, tolerabili-ee.
Furthermore, you end up wondering about the Ting Tings longevi-ee. On the evidence of We Started Nothing, they could theoretically be Blondie, who also had a photogenic frontwoman, understood that a certain lack of depth was no barrier to making fantastic pop singles, but had a tendency to follow up said fantastic pop singles with faintly underwhelming albums. Or they could be the Knack - That's Not My Name also recalls their solitary 1979 hit My Sharona. It's hard to tell from a debut album that's all over bar the shouting after 11 admittedly wonderful minutes.
See Also
