Brimming with vibrant electro-pop, MisterWives second album is impossibly addictive. The New York sextet continue to create a multi-layered blend of vintage and modern on Connect The Dots. The aptly named album draws a direct line from the 80s influences that are rooted in the genesis of the band and blend them with contemporary beats to craft alternate pop music like nobody else.
The opener, Machine is defiant pop at its best, raising issues about modern society, technology and praising individuality. The energy is cranked up from the beginning of the track, with a killer chorus to die for. Mandy Lee's distinctive vocal grabs your ear with her lilting vocals that are reminiscent of Shakira and Dolores O'Riordan.
Drummer Boy wracks up the 80s sound in the chorus of this quirky love song. Revolution mixes politics and pop, adding with a deeper and darker message with its intense verse contrasting against its Euro-pop chorus. My Brother continues this serious tone with a track about depression, it's sensitively delivered with Lee demonstrating her power and tenderness as a vocalist. Oh Love flips their sound again, bringing in a gutsier alt rock sound that is different from anything else on offer. In fact, that's part of their charm, they could never be accused of being samey or predictable.
Despite the band's colourful cartoon characters on the cover art and the album name paying reference to childhood, Connect The Dots is a maturely written album which happily releases its inner child. It's packed with attitude and energy from start to finish. There's splattering of Madonna, Avril Lavigne and Nelly Furtado along the way too. For those who miss the fun of 80s pop and yearn for something with a bit more substance in today's overly constructed and electronic hit parade, MisterWives once again prove that they are ahead of the curve of modern popular music.
Groupie Rating 4/5
