Broken Bells - After The Disco

The second full length collaboration between The Shins’ James Mercer and Brian ‘Danger Mouse’ Burton is, if anything, even more engaging than its 2010 predecessor. Sure, on the surface, it’s all throwaway ‘80s electro-pop, but delve a little deeper and you find yourself face-to-groin with a seriously addictive collection of tunes brimming with lyrical astuteness and more hooks than a pirates’ convention.

The scene is immediately set with stunning album opener, ‘Perfect World’. It starts with a simple, incessant beat, before effortlessly hooking you into its shiny synth pop embrace. Then James Mercer’s voice floats in. “Oh London moon, help me stumble home/ Let me lose myself along the way/ I’ve got nothing left, it’s kind of wonderful/ ‘Cause there’s nothing they can take away”. After four and a half minutes, it all breaks down into a more organic, acoustic coda, before finishing in an anthemic M83-esque fist-pumping surge. As opening statements go, it’s special.

It’s quickly followed by the brash electro-pop of the title-track, the new soul stylings of recent single ‘Holding On For Life’ – Barry Bee Gee jamming with Massive Attack? – and the relatively restrained acoustic swing of ‘Leave It Alone’, complete with four-piece choir on backing vocals, as Mercer vents his spleen against someone what done him wrong.

The 17-piece Angel City String Orchestra augment Burton and Mercer’s arrangements on no fewer than five tracks, including the infectious canter of ‘The Changing Lights’, the mid-paced psychedelic Lennon-esque pop of ‘Lazy Wonderland’, the string- soaked comedown of ‘The Angel And The Fool’ and the overblown falsetto finale, ‘The Remains Of Rock & Roll’.

They make full use of a bouncy brass section on the slinky ‘No Matter What You’re Told’, but maybe the budget didn’t stretch far enough to keep them for the funky strut of ‘Control’, which is crying out for horns to elevate it to the status of greatness. That’s a minor quibble. Much more than a side- project, Broken Bells is fast becoming a vital vehicle for both of these creative talents.