les fauves

REVIEWS:

The Line Of Best Fit (UK)

From the opening line of ‘Please Please Please’, where singer Pap drawls, “I was waiting for the sunsheeeine� like the long lost Italian bastard brother of the Gallaghers, its obvious that Les Fauves are going to be entertaining. And while it may have taken a while for Strokes-ish post punk to make it to Bologna, when it’s this much fun, who cares?
They’ve supported the likes of Dirty Pretty Things and Art Brut, and claim influences such as Violent Femmes, Devo and The Cramps, and frankly that pretty much puts you in the right ball park. They’ve taken the cool, quirky garage keyboard punk of New York and added some Euro bonkers to it, which works amazingly well.
‘In The Fallout Shelter’ is stripped to the bone in that way Violent Femmes do perfectly, mixing garage simplicity and pogo attitude and making into pop. ‘Fava Go Go Dancer’ is a genuine two-and-a-half-minute pop gem, which I can’t wait to see live when they head this way in May. ‘Twist Twist’ gives a definite nod to New Traditionalists era Devo, while keeping the garage racket intact and the dancing pace up.
After the chilled ‘Atomic Winter’, its back to pogo frenzy mode with ‘Novara’ (which reminds me of ‘Turning Japanese’ by The Vapours), and so it goes on. Oodles of late 70s post punk references, bonkers words (deliberate or not, they’re thoroughly entertaining) and sing-a-long-a popiness makes this thoroughly enjoyable; The Strokes meets the circus, with lyrics by The Happy Mondays.
Unfortunately things take a bit of a turn for the mediocre when the track numbers drift into double figures (with the notable exception of the rollicking ‘Bombs on the Siae’), making me wish it’d been one of those 25-minute mini albums, but there’s enough joi de vive in the first nine tracks to keep this spinning in my player for a long time yet.
Chris Marling

Crazewire (GER)

Indie Dance Rock`n´Roll. Abgedroschen, schrill und pink. Dazu ein Hauch Glamour und fertig sind Les Fauves. Die Italiener mit dem französischen Bandnamen haben nun ihr Debüt veröffentlicht, dass dreizehn tanzbare 60s Indie-Pop Stücke beinhaltet, die mächtig auf die Kacke hauen. Treibende Bässe und aufdringliche schrille Stimmen scheinen das Konzept der Italiener zu sein. Das alles hört sich an wie auf einem rasenden Karussell mit zu viel Zuckerwatte.
Dabei ist Italien nicht gerade die Geburtsstätte des Indie-Rocks. Trotzdem entsteht ein sehr englisch klingendes und tolles Indiealbum, dass auf dem italienischen Label Urtovox veröffentlicht wurde.
Sie spielten schon im Vorprogramm von Art Brut und den Dirty Pretty Things. Dort konnten sie sicherlich etwas von dem Spaßmacher Eddie Argos und der guten Seite der Libertines, Carl Barat, abgucken. Lupenreine Hits wie Fava Go Go Dancer“ beweisen, dass sich was tut im stiefelförmigen Lande der Mafia und Spaghetti. Die 2006 erschienene EP mit dem wunderlichem Namen Our Dildo Can Change Your Life“ hat bereits das Konzept der Band erkennen lassen, das auf dem aktuellen Album ebenfalls wieder zu finden ist. The First Part of A Trilogy About Lights And Shades Of Alien Behaviour�. Wenn sich das nicht nach einem Plan anhört. Und mit ein bisschen Hype wird diese Band auch in hiesigen Indiebars ein Zuhause finden.
Christopher Szwabczynski

Bearded Magazine (UK)

It seems there has always been a division in punk; the UK had its contingent and the US had their own. Each found ways to stress the problems of their homeland, singing about the places they were from and generally capitalising on their nationalities. But punk isn’t a purely political thing anymore; it’s less and less about society’s problems and increasingly about hairstyles. There isn’t much of identity left to it, but ideas and problems relating to identity reach far beyond music.
Enter Les Fauves: It would be a stretch to call them political, although they are socially aware, even if in terms of people watching as opposed to revolutionary causes. And they do have stylish haircuts, but we won’t hold it against them. Lead singer Pap sounds like he’s trying a little too hard to stress that American accent, which might be more forgivable if he wasn’t Italian. It should probably be allowed for that if you’re singing in a language that is not your native tongue you will adapt the accent to some effect, but there are times when it is really over the top. The boy has got a very strong set of vocal chords and can yowl and wail in a way that would make an angry cat step back (it’s a good thing); he shouldn’t try to emulate the Americans he could easily out-shout. Indeed, some of the more palatable songs are those in which Pap sounds the least American, for example ‘Atomic Winter’ and ‘Please Please Please’.
There are moments when they pull all of their best qualities together and those are some truly impressive moments. ‘No Spaghindie,’ which takes th - urtovox