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No. 1 | 15319__fischer_l
TOTAL RECALL The time-warped Fischerspooner
Fischer Spooner: Stephane Sednaoui

Credits

Release Date: Feb 25, 2003; Lead Performance: Fischerspooner; Genre: Electronica
C+
By David Browne
David Browne
David Browne
David Browne is EW's music critic and author of ''Dream Brother: The Lives & Music of Jeff & Tim Buckley'' (HarperCollins)

Fischerspooner are obsessed with a style of the '80s: old-wave techno-pop (now called electroclash). Their debut, #1, has everything one would want from an album recorded in, say, 1982: farty synths and ping-pongy drum machines, a blood-drained singer, synthetic hand claps. It's both impressive (the whooshy ''Emerge'' and a cover of Wire's ''The 15th'') and pointless. Thin songwriting doesn't help either. The new element Fischerspooner bring to the table is kitsch: With their campy costumes and Twyla Tharp-on-X dance troupe, they're as much a performance-art project as a group. The way the band cherishes and mocks its sources says a lot about what distinguishes the '80s renaissance from previous revivals. Everybody may be walking on sunshine, but they're winking all the while.


Posted Feb 24, 2003
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