Los Campesinos! taste like a sugar high!

The internet is a Very Good Thing. Sure, we’ve known that forever but now and then there comes a moment when we really realise it and sometimes it goes a little like this.

I’m bored of listening to the same old tunes,  I want something fresh!…but where to go?…oh hey, I remember Ra Ra Riot once rating this station called WOXY, I wonder if they’re online..they are!!! High fives! Let’s stream…ooh, this tune’s crazy, I wonder who it’s by…some kids called Los Campesinos!? I’ve never heard of them, I wonder if I can hear more on Spotify…I can!!! And they’re crazy awesome!!! WIN!!!

And when you consider the entire thought process above took about about 17 seconds, it becomes even more apparent that when it comes to music, the interwebz kicks all kinds of ass.

Los Campesinos! (yes, that ! is part of a name, not just an indication of my overflowing enthusiasm for these kids) are like the Welsh Ra Ra Riot who have been force-fed all kinds of sugary delights filled with terrifying E numbers and then sat in front of a grab-bag of instruments. Wild, poppy, and slightly mad, sunshine results. So do titles like You! Me! Dancing!, We Throw Parties You Throw Knives and This is How You Spell “HAHAHA, We Destroyed the Hopes and Dreams of an Entire Generation of Faux-Romantics” (nope, I’m not even kidding). How they manage to pull that shit off and not come across as unbearably pretentious amazes me, but it probably has something to do with their aforementioned cheery vibes.

There’s even a hint of a hint of Art Brut in the occasionally spat-more-than-sung vocals, though cheery melodies and token glockenspeil tend to take the edge of any real malevolence in the sometimes cryptic, sometimes bonkers lyrics (There’s red stains all over the place/But they’re not blood, they’re cherryade/We throw parties, you throw knives/It’s all the same if the fizzy drinks are nice). Though they can seem in danger of making a racket rather than a tune, they always manage to stay just this side of melody and not quite let themselves completely explode from their crazy, shouty, jumpy energy. In fact, the joyful rebellion of LC’s riotous, cacophonous sound will make you want to climb on the nearest table, throw your hands up in defiance at how crap the world is and cry, ‘Sod it! We can still have fun even if everything has gone to hell in a handbasket! AND WE WILL!’ and, to be quite frank, who doesn’t need that right now?

Do yourself a favour pronto and check these guys out. You’ll thank me. I take cheques.

My Los Campesinos! picks on Spotify

Myspace

Website (it’s worth noting that they’re pretty regular bloggers)

Twitter

Here, have a video, because I bloody LOVE YOU (and there’s CONFETTI! and RAINBOWS! and KITTENS! Huzzah!)…