Beginning your press release with the above quote, citing your genres as:
Indie/French Pop/Very Rock and including Serge Gainsbourg and Gilgamesh in your list of influences are all very brave (some would say bizarre) moves to make. The great thing about Import, though, is that Elle Macho somehow manages to deliver on each and every of their lofty claims and promises about their own greatness. The band consists of Butterfly Boucher, David Mead and Lindsay Jamieson. Butterfly's previous solo record was something of a hit with me. Here, the melodic nous of that album is augmented with a solid slab of attitude and aggression. Boucher is joined by the creative guitar of David Mead, and by Ben Folds alumni Lindsay Jamieson on drums. Jamieson also twirled the sticks for the much-feted (by me at least) Astronaut Pushers back in the day, so this is a Nashvillian supergroup of sorts.
What we have here is a collection of 10 flat-out great songs. Allez La Danse and This Is Not a Love Song stick out on first listen, but over time, each and every song has sunk into my psyche and forced its way out in the form of humming, air drumming, jiving (I do jive, but only privately) to the stops, starts and twitches, and generally marvelling at the balance between intelligent, pop songwriting, and creativity in structuring and progression. There isn't a song here you won't tap your feet to. Fact. There isn't a song here which is lacking a nifty twist in the rhythm section (Glow in the Dark), or a tag section which goes somewhere unexpected (Conquistador). At the same time, however, these are the kind of pop songs that should be invading your radio, interrupting your restaurant dinner because you have to work out the drum pattern with spoons, and leading you to make it your life's ambition to see the band in a small, sweaty room.
If we lived in a fair world, Elle Macho would be huge. Make it happen
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