Apparently the Pipettes were conceived by their guitarist Monster Bobby as "an experiment in band-making" - which accounts nicely for their name, both a laboratory instrument and a reference to The Ronnettes, one of the girl groups from pop's golden era whose sound The Pipettes were determined to modernize. Bobby assembled a band of male backing musicians (nicknamed "The Cassettes") who stay in the shadows while the 3 female vocalists steal the spotlight. Fortunately he didn't go all Phil Spector on them and try to mastermind it all from the backstage, but instead he let them function as a true rock band: All (boys and girls) share the songwriting credits, although the lyrics are always written from the girls' perspective - usually a bit on the naughty side, reveling in a role reversal of the classic boy/girl pop narratives: these girls deride guys for thinking they could be more than an "One Night Stand" on the eponymous upbeat number, or for being bookish and not interested in having sex with them on "ABC". And they also do have a song called "Sex", but don't get me wrong: this isn't some kind of female Mötley Crüe - more like a PG-rated version of 60's girl pop that recognizes that girls are entitled to have some fun, and to be independent, even kind of naughty if they so feel like. The music strikes a perfect balance between retro and now-pop: the girls' harmonies, polka-dot dresses and dance moves come straight from the early 60's, just like the old-fashioned strings and brass arrangements. The beats on the other side -even when they pay tribute to Motown, as in the album's highlight "Pull Shapes"- have a frenzier, more danceable quality, incorporating everything that came later, be it ABBA, Bananarama, or electro-pop. And while it's the faster, more manic, numbers that stayed with me ("Your Kisses Are Wasted on Me", "One Night Stand", "Dirty Mind"), others may be drawn to the ballads ("A Winter's Sky", "I Love You") with their seductive vocals and sugary strings. Truth be told, at least 10 of the album's 15 songs (including bonus track "Really That Bad") could have been singles: they're hooky as hell, melodic, danceable, lots of fun, and never overstay their welcome with most of them clocking under 3 minutes - the complete CD duration stays well below 40 minutes. Opener "We Are The Pipettes" stands out from the rest with its early B52's sci-fi schtick. It sounds a bit silly at first, but after listening to the whole CD a couples of times it comes through as an original, zany, entertaining, moment inside a more calculated whole. Because, although it'd be unfair to say the songs all sound the same, they mostly seem to follow the same recipe. Like the abuse of a special effect in a movie: impressive at first, but every time it's used it loses some of its power and the green screen magic behind it threatens to get exposed. I guess that's the one fault of The Pipettes: A brilliant idea, impeccably executed, yet still there's something artificial about them. Compare them with their organically-grown 80's counterparts The Go Go's, and you'll see what I mean.
**** for Pull Shapes, Why Did You Stay?, Dirty Mind, Your Kisses Are Wasted on Me, One Night Stand
*** for We Are the Pipettes, It Hurts to See You Dance So Well, Judy, A Winter's Sky, Tell Me What You Want, Because It's Not Love (But It's Still a Feeling), Sex, ABC, I Love You, Really That Bad
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