Dance-punk, like everything else mid-2000s related, is back, baby. I wrote a bit about its return in a recent feature for Exclaim! Originally pitched as something geared towards the broader indie sleaze aesthetic, my editor suggested narrowing the focus. Smart suggestion!
As I wrote in the piece, dance punk was “part of a broader interest in post-punk” that “burned bright in the mid-2000s, merging punk's jagged energy with dance music's smooth grooves.” Its lasting legacy has probably been “the idea that indie rock and dance music need not be mutually exclusive.”
That story details what I consider to be a number of Canadian bands from this era that I hope are not lost to the dustbin of history (again). For this newsletter, however, I wanted to zoom out a bit and do the same for artists from the US, UK, and anywhere else that might have been producing like-minded artists during this time.
Dance-punk’s tropes took a while to take hold. So interest in new bands that fit the extremely malleable mold, coupled with its overlap with a broader interest in underground music meant that a lot of weird and wonderful stuff — few would call it dance-punk today — got sucked into its orbit. For a while, anything that could get the indie kids’ butts on the dancefloor counted, and I’ve tried to reflect this.
To be clear, I’m skipping over the big guns — LCD Soundsystem, Yeah Yeah Yeah, Bloc Party, etc. — to big up some of the also-rans and never-weres. Maybe these artists were part of the pack at the time but couldn’t make it last over the long term; maybe they got a bit of buzz but things fizzled; maybe nobody ever really took much note but damn well should have.
Whatever the case, here are 11 underrated bands from the dance-punk era.
In Many ways, !!! (pronounced Chk-chk-chk) were the quintessential dance-punk group: four-on-the-floor house beats, hi-hats, slinky bass lines, and palm-muted chk-chk guitars with a tall and skinny white guy yelling over top. Yet the Sacramento, CA crew have proven to be a surprisingly enduring presence, churning out great records that showcase the breadth of the band’s taste and talent. If you remember them, it’s probably for their breakout, “Me and Giuliani Down by the School Yard (A True Story).” The track was a nine-minute dancefloor protest against the former NYC mayor’s liberal use of archaic laws to punish dancing that also interpolates “Footloose.” It rightly predicted the city’s creative deadening and is an absolute monster banger.
The mid-2000s were when the internet hype cycle for bands really took hold. Among the earliest recipients of the Myspace/Pitchfork/HypeMachine/Hipsterrunoff bump, Black Kids’ Wizard of Ahhhs demo caught fire and suddenly the band were the hot new thang. Unfortunately for them, by the time their debut hit the streets, the Jacksonville, FL group were also an early example of internet backlash. Even if the hype outstripped the end result, Partie Traumatic was still a great collection of dancey indie rock tunes, with anthem “I’m Not Gona Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You” its centre-piece.
The Futureheads were stumping for Kate Bush long before the music supervisors at Stranger Things finally broke the British singer in America 30-plus years after the fact. But their cover of “Hounds of Love” wasn’t even the best thing on their nervy 2004 self-titled debut. Blog hype, soundtrack syncs and tours with the likes of Franz Ferdinand (I saw the two bands play together in Vancouver in 2005) brought them to the cusp of a mainstream breakthrough. But even with a pretty good follow-up like 2006’s News and Tributes, they were never quite able to re-create their debut’s energy.
Brighton, UK’s The Go! Team were music nerd catnip from the word *ahem* go, building their songs from dusty samples, dissonant guitars and chanted vocals. On paper, it was the definition of record collector rock, but in practice Ian Parton, the group’s sole member on their debut, made his eclectic influences gel into something truly electric that was equal parts Paul’s Boutique and Sonic Youth. The success of Thunder, Lightning, Strike! led Parton to turn The Go! Team into a proper band who continue to make great, if somewhat underrated, records. But they’ve never quite been able — or interested — in recreating the rush that came with their DIY debut.
For a hot minute in 2006, Sheffield, UK’s The Long Blondes burned as bright as many of the scene’s heavyweights. Owing as much to Britpop groups like Elastica as they did to garage rock and post-punk, the five-piece’s debut, Someone to Drive You Home, produced by Pulp’s Steve Mackey, offered a female POV from singer Kate Jackson that won over critics and indie fans alike. “Couples” was similarly heralded in 2008. Sadly guitarist and primary songwriter Dorian Cox suffered a stroke that same year which effectively ended the group until a recent reunion.
Sweden bossed the 2000s. From Max Martin and co.’s pop chart dominance to the onslaught of garage (The Hives), indie (Ravonettes) and folk (Jens Lenkman) artists, the Scandinavian nation spent the decade punching above its cultural weight. Gothenburg’s Love is All were arguably the grooviest of the Swedish wave, boasting barnstorming guitars punctuated by skronking sax and singer Josephine Olausson’s yelping vocals. They released three records in five years, all of them quite good, before disappearing into the indie ether. It’s a shame because they were so much fun. More than any other band on this list, Love is All had a knack for matching their infectious energy with infectious pop hooks.
Fun fact: Adele producer Paul Epworth got his start producing indie records in the mid-2000s. In 2004 and 2005 he went on a tear, producing debut albums by the Futureheads, Bloc Party and, finally, Maxïmo Park. While I maintain it is the lesser of those three records, that’s not to say A Certain Trigger isn’t good. Filled with nervy guitars and jittery vocals à la Gang of Four and Wire, the Newcastle group were quintessential post-punk indebted dance-punk group, which might be the biggest knock against them. At the time, there wasn’t a lot to distinguish Maximo Park from the many the 2005 pack. But history has been kind to the band, who continue to regularly drop new records and be part of the broader conversation while many of their peers have disappeared or live in the shadow of past triumphs. Sometimes music is a marathon not a sprint.
Their sound was more of a throwback to 60s girl groups, but the Pipettes nevertheless got a foothold in the indie-sphere during this period singing indie rock adjacent songs about boys and dancing. I’ve always thought of their rise as a by-product of the rediscovery of groups like Blondie, who filtered 60s pop through a new wave lens, while presaging the Girls in the Garage sound bands like Vivian Girls, Best Coast and Bleached made popular just a few years later. Their short lifespan would suggest the Pipettes were a gimmick that quickly ran its course. But their insanely catchy songs on their debut, We Are the Pipettes, and the longtail careers of its members, particularly Gwenno Saunders, offer proof that there was a lot more substance than meets the eye to this group.
I’ve always had a soft spot for Reality Check, the 2008 album The Teenagers put out before disappearing into the ether from which they came. They first gained notoriety with “Homecoming,” a weirdly catchy single about cross-Atlantic lust between step-cousins. It doesn’t come much sleazier than that! There was some success with follow-up singles like “Starlett Johansson,” and they landed some syncs with shows like Gossip Girl. But what were the Teenagers? Sly social commentary? A joke taken too far? Some French dudes looking to get a foothold in the blogosphere? Whatever the case, their record is better than their reputation would have you believe. Now, “Take your pen, write it down: I love the Teenagers.”
New York’s Radio 4 arrived too early to fully capitalize on dance-punk’s mainstream-ish breakthrough. But their 2001 single, “Dance to the Underground” codified what became the genre’s hallmarks and later, through no fault of Radio 4, cliches. Their 2004 major-label debut was poorly received and isn’t even currently available on streaming. But their second LP, 2001’s Gotham! produced by the then still unknown production duo The DFA (James Murphy and Tim Goldsworthy) is a diamond waiting in the rough for rediscovery.
Louisville, KY crew VHS or Beta are probably best remembered for their new wavey single “Night on Fire.” But the group started life sounding more like an indie-rock take on French touch. Arriving in the lull period between Daft Punk’s Discovery and the mid-decade rise of Ed Banger via Justice and Uffie’ “Pop the Glock,” the band’s debut EP Le Funk seems like a lost treasure ripe for indie sleaze reclamation.
Kool Kids Self-promotion Club
Been hitting the Toronto live music circuit hard (for me at least) lately. First up, local phenoms July Talk played a two-night stand at Massey Hall last month. Reviewing the first night, I noted that “the six-piece once again highlighted that it's on stage where their songs truly come alive.”
I also caught Softcult’s headlining gig at The Drake Underground. Besides being a great show, it also marked the band’s return to the stage where they had played their very first live show just a year prior. “Just a year ago … they were still figuring out how to put all the pieces of their sound and aesthetic together. Now, they're a fully formed unit, transitioning seamlessly between songs as singer-guitarist Mercedes Arn-Horn and her sister, drummer Phoenix, traded verses.”
Finally, US Girls played their first show in three years this month with a low-key, invite-only show at the Drake Underground as the band starts to promote their new album Bless This Mess. “This semi-secret night was also the debut of a new, economical five-piece version of U.S. Girls, whose local shows often challenged the size of the stage on which they were performing.”
Kool Kids Recommendation Club
Vaporwave godhead George Clanton just dropped the 90s-biting banger “I Been Young.” I’m getting big Soul II Soul and early Seal vibes here. Clanton made his name as a solo artist, the face behind ESPRIT 空想, and as the head of 100% Electronica, a record label specializing in dreamy, nostalgia-soaked electronic music. The song, which appears to be a one-off single, finds Clanton apologizing for some unknown transgression, chalking the offense up to youthful hubris. Very relatable!
Snow Strippers are barely 18 months old. But the Detroit duo have ascended quickly thanks to their ability to channel the glitchy noise of early Crystal Castles and witchy grooves of fellow Michiganders Salem into confrontational pop-adjacent bangers. Of course the association of producer Graham Perez, aka deliverthecrush, with red hot production crew Surf Gang probably helped as well. Snow Strippers just dropped two new tracks, the hypnotic “Don’t You Feel” and the pummelling “Under Your Spell,” a great showcase for singer Tatiana Schwaninger.
For years, Alaska Reid bounced between her Montana hometown and Los Angeles making music under many different guises. Disenchanter, her debut album out July 14, finally finds a through-line in her disperate influences — country, pop, alt-rock — folding them all into a single voice. Music and life partner AG Cook, known for his work with Charli XCX and as head of the PC Music crew, handles production, ensuring that the tracks always feel nicely left-of-centre without overshadowing Reid. “Back to This,” one of the record’s highlights examines the idea of looking at your past self and wondering how you got from that person to the one you are today.
Baltimore’s JPEGMAFIA and Detroit’s Danny Brown are two of modern hip hop’s more iconoclastic MCs, regularly spitting in the face of current trends to forge their own, often bizarre and one assumes chemically enhanced reality. So it makes sense that the two would team up for Scaring the Hoes. JPGMAFIA - Peggy to his friends and admirers - produced the whole thing and it’s an appropriately strange and often confrontational listen. Brown does a lot of unsung work keeping things (relatively) grounded with his trademark oddball, helium-inflected flow, particularly the title track on which he spits over a squeaky sax sample and live drums.
I’ve written about Beabadoobee plenty before, but I wanted to highlight this loosie Beatrice Laus dropped on Valentine’s Day. It’s a lovely little acoustic number about being in love, without a hint of irony: “I guess I'm stuck forever By the glue, oh, and you.” While I’ve never been one to wear my emotions on my sleeve, I appreciate artists who can. The video was shot by Bea and her partner, who I assume the song is about (scan-dahl if not!), in the Philippines, where Laus was born, to boot. There’s a version of this that features Clairo, but her presence is relatively negligible and given the intimacy of the tune, I prefer the original version.
Ian Gormely is a freelance music journalist based in Toronto.
Hit up koolkidsmusicclub@gmail.com for questions, criticisms and submissions.