1990's Get Their Kicks

The 1990's are from Scotland and at one time were home to two members of Franz Ferdinand. Singer/guitarist Alex Kapranos and drummer Paul Thompson left the band to focus on making music for girls to dance to, while the 1990's picked up the pieces and continued on. Now on to their second full length,Kicks, the band has put their past behind them, come into their own, and come up with one heck of an album to boot.

Raw and rambunctious, Kicksis a spiky pop album that has a wee bit of a punk rock edge and a smidgen of rock and roll swagger mixed into it's indie rock heart. Think of the 1990's as a bit of old Pastels meets a bit of Primal Scream and Kicks as Scottish pop with rock and roll coursing through it's veins. The band and the album both have an attitude about them that's carefree, cocky, and up for just about anything.

A vast majority of Kickssounds untamed and underproduced in the best way imaginable. "Tell Me When You're Ready," for example, has riffs bigger than Britain and a hook the size of Texas but sounds as if it were recorded for about $5 (or pounds in this case). It's a tune that's so incredibly catchy that the State Department has issued a warning against traveling to Scotland for fear of bringing the song back to the States. Now if you take that example and multiply it by about nine or ten and ignore the warnings, you'd have a global aural crisis that has Kicks written all over it. See, "I Don't Even Know What Time It Is," and "Sparks," for further proof of just how infectious this little record is.

They might have lost Alex and Paul to Franz Ferdinand years ago, but 1990's have more than made up for their loss with two fantastically brilliant pop records. While their debut Cookies established the band's greatness, Kicks cements it into place. Kicksis an entertaining blast of uncompromising rock, punk, and indie swagger that never loses sight of the songs despite being shambolic and that's why it succeeds.