DAT Politics - Mad Kit (2009)

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The first thing that springs to mind after an initial traipse through the surreal electronic pop wonderland that is Mad Kit has to be: how did Crystal Castles find so much success when this lot have being doing that stuff way better and for way longer? In all fairness you'd have to conclude that DAT Politics haven't quite achieved a 'Crimewave' moment of their own thus far, and they don't quite have that emotronica glamour going for them, but as far as heavily pixellated pop exuberance goes, these guys are pretty hard to fault. The joyous laptop-crunching melodicism of 'Bad Dream Machine' sets an early benchmark, sounding frivolous and more than faintly ridiculous, but never resorting to kitsch or slapstick tendencies. Delving a little deeper, 'Wish Ya' taps into the hipster electro-house bitstream of Digitonal and the like, which might be seen as something of a step backwards for a group who've been around long enough to know better than to dabble in stylistic fads. Regardless, the end result is sufficiently ludicrous to make the grade and slots nicely into 'Huff & Puff's absurd Helen Love-meets-Kraftwerk aesthetic. The AM/FM mix of 'Step Back' seems to further organize the unruly, DSP-munching Dat Politics sound, presenting a comparatively sensible techno-centric pop song in which the hook-lines aren't entirely frazzled and obscured by wayward circuitry. BOOMKAT