“I’m losing my edge to the art-school Brooklynites in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered eighties.” LCD Soundsystem 'Losing My Edge'

This remarkable concept album about playboy John Zachary De Lorean and his failed dream to take on General Motors with his stainless steel sports car the DMC-12 is obviously, without wanting to be too ungallant, the work of people who remember the 80s well. Relaxed front man of the Super Furry Animals Gruff Rhys and up-’til-now esoteric electronica producer Boom Bip have joined forces to forge an absolutely confounding and mesmerising mix of high gloss 80s pop, Giorgio Moroder disco, high cheek-boned synth work and blue eyed soul. So while they hit some of the reference points that arch ironists such as Chromeo (and by extension Johnny Two Hats from The Mighty Boosh’s Kraftwerk Orange) touch on; they do so without a smirk. They do so with love for the source material.

Admittedly they give props to the icy, booming MOOG reverberations of Gary Numan; and who doesn’t? (No one would have believed in the first years of the 1990s that the Nume would be rescued from critical purgatory to become such a touch stone again.) Elsewhere however they are relishing in the rolled-up sleeve keytar soloing of Jan Hammer, the crisp drum machine programming of Mantronix, the dramatic swagger of ABC, the slick come hither croon of Hall and Oates. And on and on. I mean, they’ve even been named twice like Duran Duran, The The and Talk Talk before them " although perhaps the most proximal reference point here is Desireless’s ’Voyage Voyage’.

The subject matter is perfect because De Lorean can be so readily taken as a symbol of the decadence of the decade, when F Scott Fitzgerald’s maxim that there were no second acts in American public life still held true. He was an impulsive car designer for GM in Detroit. Despite the fact he designed the wildly popular ’rod’ the Pontiac GTO, the powers that were in Motor City didn’t share his enthusiasm for swinging with young models and stars like Raquel Welch and Ursula Andress and he struck out on his own. The DMC-12 was a fine looking car by anyone standards (it is, of course, the time machine in the Back To The Future films) but it went into production during a recession and De Lorean was on the ropes within months. This in turn led on to his ill-advised attempt to buy his way out of trouble by buying into a cocaine smuggling operation.

Of course it goes without saying that the phrase “concept album” can bring a chill to even the most hardy of hearts but forget about hairy berks Marillion and Jethro Tull for a second. Think of this more as the OST compiled by Danny Krivit to the best John Hughes movie never made about break dancing, cocaine and sports cars and you’re closer to the mark. Given his work on such projects as the anticon affiliated digital psychedelia outfit cLOUDDEAD, you could not have predicted such a tuneful effort from Boom Bip and it’s also refreshing to hear Gruff completely free from the pot head humour and self-indulgence that sometimes blights the work of SFA.

They set their stall out well with ’Neon Theme’ which is like the arpeggiated menace of John Carpenter at his soundtrack best. The 80s cocaine success rock of ’Dream Cars’ speaks of hopes as yet unspoiled by FBI drug busts and financial ruin. ’Raquel’ reimagines the unlikely love affair over harsh Roland drum programming that slowly gives way to Vince Clarke synth majesty and Gruff’s slightly surreal, English as second language, lyrics. But this is some of this album’s genius right here; these are no slavish copies but the building of a parallel universe where it is 1983 right now. A universe where the rum booty bass of Spank Rock seeps in through wormholes. A universe where killer lesbian MCs Yo Majesty turn up to invert all the sexist Rn’B lyrical traditions on one of the album’s peaks ’Sweat Shop’. Elsewhere on ’I Lust U’, a duet between Gruff and Cate Le Bon, homage is paid to the Pet Shop Boys’ ’Rent’ and Depeche Mode’s ’People Are People’. Inventive and enjoyable " this is certain to be regarded as one of the best pop albums of the year.

Also try: Mantronix Mantronix: The Album, Spank Rock YoYoYoYoYo, John Carpenter Escape From New York OST

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