New Pants - Equal Love (Album)
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New Pants are a four piece from Beijing, China, they play rock music infused with a little bit of electro. Its fair to say they have built somewhat of a small following in Australia, having toured here in 2007 with Regurgitator (who are actually thanked on the album credits). There latest is titled Equal Love and it comes with a Bonus DVD including a number of music videos for your visual stimulation.
It should be noted that the majority of the lyrics are sung in Cantonese. But this doesn’t really matter, as the album features heavily synthesized vocals. The result is that most of the lyrics are almost inaudible and resemble electronic mess, but this of little consequence to non Chinese speakers.
The album begins with a gem of a melodic opener to set the scene of what is to come. The guitar riffs are simple and the drum beats uncomplicated, giving the album a very distinctive lo-fi sound.
Overall, the synthesized delivery of lyrics, form an essential part of many of the tracks on the album. It really is a case of vocoder galore on this album. Across the album, one cannot help infer a commercial take on 80s electronic pop. The majority of New Pants songs are mildy catchy, but some lack the real hooky punchlines that are present on the highlight tracks.
The tail end of this album is quite a nugget and incidentally this is where the vocoder is forgotten and we get the natural delivery of vocals by the lead. If you have a penchant for robot sounds, this could be a charming and entertaining album for you.
