mp3: let’s make love and listen to death from above (album version)
mp3: let’s make love and listen to death from above (spank rock remix)
mp3: this month day ten
mov: meeting paris hilton (live)
mov: metal (random headbanging movie…)
sao paulo’s cansei de ser sexy (aka css) have had a flogging on various blogs over the last few months, but i make no apologies for throwing my own two cents into the ring. truth is, i’m in love with this band – their debut sub-pop album is one of the most refreshing and liberating releases this year. devoid of pretention and rammed with attitude, the self-titled ‘cansei de ser sexy’ is a pop album like no other.
cansei de ser sexy (“tired of being sexy”) epitomise smart party music – their heads are just as likely to be found inside pitchfork as the national enquirer. they seem to be both simultaneously repulsed by and deeply attracted to trash celebrity, all the while thrashing out tunes that call the communual spirit of blondie, chicks on speed, the sugarcubes, lcd soundsystem, peaches, sleater kinney – they’re all in there somewhere.
backstory: brazil’s trama virtual is similar to myspace, with 35,000 bands vying for your download attention. five girls, a vocalist named lovefoxxx, punk pop songs, short shorts, lyrics about j-lo and paris – is it any wonder css left 34,999 other bands in their wake? fotologs apparently played a large part in this story; each member of the band has their own individual photo blog, and there’s a sixth communal photo blog for the band. then there’s the myspace pages, the band blog, the web site, the label site… if the arctic monkeys hadn’t grabbed the crown, then css might well be the web’s latest, greatest superstars.
i had the good fortune to interview bassist ira trevison this week, who told me that they were not a brazilian band, and not a sao paulo band – rather the internet is their geographic terrain, and without citizenship, their career would have gone nowhere; the resultant signing to the legendary sub pop would have been nothing but a wet dream. you can hear the full interview this sunday on fat planet on sydney’s fbi radio (3pm, aest), podcast to follow shortly thereafter.
css’ self-titled album is out now on sub pop, the ‘let’s make love and listen death from above’ single is released on 8th august featuring the above mix from spank rock and another from the ubiquitous diplo. also worth a hunt is a 2005 brazilian release which features their cover of madonna‘s ‘hollywood’, plus their own original bastard pop tracks featuring heads-to-heads such as blondie vs the undertones, missy versus the yeah yeah yeahs and the hilarious track ‘i want to be your j-lo’.
if you have any doubts, download the live video clip of ‘meeting paris hilton’ and tell me you’re not infatuated.
canseidesersexy.com
myspace.com/canseidesersexy
fotolog.com/canseidesersexy
stream the new video clip for ‘let’s make love…’