WARMDUSCHER

At The Hotspot (Bella Union) 

Warmduscher have upped the malformed funk on their third album, At The Hotspot, produced by Joe Goddard and Al Doyle of Hot Chip. Hot Shot bangs out the filthy funk-rock riffs a la N*E*R*D with a gleeful steel-drum Boney M chorus.

The discofied Wild Flowers and its pottymouthed diatribes reek of Travis Bickle in a paranoid sweat seething in the corner of Studio 54. Sigue Sigue Sputnik and their Suicide/pop pastiche inspire Eight Million Machines, while Gary Numan would be proud of the big synths of Fatso, which is splattered with a few drops of Funkadelic.

The warped genius of George Clinton is imitated again on the 80s P-Funky Baby Toe Joe, while Twitchin In The Kitchen mashes up Sleigh Bells with leather pants-era Prince. Double Vision manages to blend the hardcore thrash of Dead Kennedys with Melt Yourself Down and Super Cool is as slick with the Detroit beats as LCD Soundsystem.

words CHRIS SEAL