Junior Boys - album review

ELECTROPOP

The so far unannounced Depeche Mode revival gets sharply booted into action by these sprightly lads from Canada who claim to be on a cutting edge of ‘Modernist MOR’ which aims to destroy the point of Blunt and co. It still just sounds like the legendary electro Basildon boys to me, with hearty injections of funk rather than junk.

Amid the torpid doppelgangering are moments of tender pleasure with the dripping, trippy ‘Count Souvenirs’ and the jolting synth pulse of ‘In the Morning’ raising the spirits. The rest veer far too close to a lurid proto-80s nightmare, a tactic which may result in this collection’s title becoming all-too prophetic.