Tokyo Police Club A Lesson In Crime

Warning! Canadian bands like to shout a lot. Where Arcade Fire might soar above the shouting of mere mortals, You Say Party! We Say Die! might shout about being mere mortals, and A Silver Mt. Zion might shout about never having met a mere mortal. Tokyo Police Club are also Canadian and shouty, and in a different way. A Lesson In Crime, their debut release, is classified as an album for chart classification's sake (whatever that means nowadays, right kids?), yet weighs in at a flyweight 16-and-a-bit minutes. So don't leave the room; you might miss something.

This fuzzy-haired quartet are jagged, and album kick-start Cheer It On mirrors this intent, grinding and roaring behind a megaphonic call to arms of "Operator! Get me the President of the world! This is an emergency!". An emergency of what? Not 16 seconds in yet and there's an emergency. Hopefully nothing important, because there are some seductive guitar twangings happening and it's quite nice. It translates as Strokes-esque, but only in terms of tinny guitar plucking and raucous garage-made drums. Beyond that there are some nice organ noises and urgency throughout. It's all very good indeed.

Quick to follow is Nature Of The Experiment, which surges and jerks with the spatial awareness of Bloc Party, only everything is squashed into 2 minutes and ends a bit too suddenly. "It's an ancient Russian proverb / I doubt it's one that you've heard" - probably not, but here's one for you: In taste and colour, you have no comrades. Good job that Tokyo Police Club aren't chefs or painters then. At least, not as their day job. Citizens Of Tomorrow, another highlight, forewarns future generations of a life in backbreaking labour building spaceships in fluourescent light for 'our robot masters'.

There's some pretty snazzy imagery going on. Dystopian, yes, but effective under a wave of echo, claps and musing, providing accurate illustration for the subject matter. Witty narrative aside, there's no need for comparison with the neck-cricking full throttled moments that Tokyo Police Club reach satisfyingly throughout these 16-and-a-bit-minutes. And it doesn't matter how short the whole ordeal is. You just better hope there's going to be more of it very soon.