<<rinôçérôse>> - <<rinôçérôse>>

Genre electronica Publisher V2 Records External Links Official rinôçérôse Website Official V2 Records Website

The 21st Century Music Fan (often lovingly called a Music Snob) can be a judgmental beast. This usually leads to some harsh cynicism. Clearly, that's why a person like me can write music reviews not even for a living, or for any sort of dough, but because he enjoys it. But those human characteristics we love so much can sometimes get in the way of enjoying an album because one doesn't like the method of marketing, the style, the fans (the biggest reason I stopped listening to Dave Matthews, besides the fact that I grew up) or, most often, the first 5 seconds of a band's sound. This almost happened to me with <<rinôçérôse>> when their first Prince-ly, AC/DC-loaded "Ooooo BITCH!" almost gave me a full-body shudder. "The fuck?!" I thought. "Was this an AC/DC wannabe/cover band?" I checked the cover. They certainly were not. "Were they just intentionally trying to remake Jet's "Cold Hard Bitch?" I took a couple Valium to calm myself down (and chased 'em with my sixth beer) and told myself to be patient, that my editor could never send me anything worse than that terrible Damone album that gave me the dry heaves for two days. And then I was rewarded. Glimmers of this band's range and talent appeared within one minute fifty with a nice Wah-guitar solo, followed by some decent synthesizer sonic parabolas. Who cares if all they were telling me was "Yer gonna be my bitch!"? That electronic sound gave me some hope that this band was a little more diverse than I originally thought.

And they definitely are. This band mixes up a plethora of sounds, from hard guitar rock, to fast electronic dance, to some chill samba. It's hard to mash these styles, and I'll be the first to admit that, at times, there are clashes, but <<rinôçérôse>> is a talented variety hour and deserves some credit for their experimentation. How else can I compliment this group? How about the fact that I put their song "Mes Vacances a Rio" on a chillax (read: make-out) mix for a sweet little thing I'd been rubbing shoulders with? Seriously, the only thing I could think about during that soft electro-Brazilian piece was her swaying her back all up against me, and putting a little push onto her ass. This song just demands that you move with it. There are even some classic porn-like "Ba-Waaoww-ow-ow-ow"s and some fantastic jazz flute thrown in for good measure. Who wouldn't want to get their hands all over someone hot upon hearing that? If you think you wouldn't, perhaps you're a eunuch. Go check, we'll wait for you.

On the most part, however, <<rinôçérôse>>'s self-titled fourth album, a collections release of sorts, is a fast moving mad dance party. Their second song, "Cublicle," is the perfect embodiment of that mentality, replete with electric-chair jolts of deep synthesizer, perfect breaks of reined in anticipation, followed by primal toe-to-tongue yells so coursing, its literally impossible not to AT LEAST make a face as if screaming along. Personally, I let it all out and when I hear it in my car, I'm smacking my steering wheel so hard that I invariably blow my horn at blind people crossing the street. Guys, if you're reading this, that was totally unintentional.

It's better to keep this album off the streets and leave it at late-night affairs. "My Demons" would probably be the best selection for these sweaty dance situations but this song is an example of <<rinôçérôse>>'s stylistic variety breaking up what I consider to be 74% of an amazing song. What plays out as a classic disco shakedown gets interrupted by ill-fitting and common-sounding angst rock interludes. Just a case of a band doing their best to fit styles seamlessly together. It's not always that easy. There are a lot of things that could have turned me away from this album and band. Their obnoxious euro-style and those pretentious accent/punctuation marks that speckle their band name, as well as their involvement in an iPod commercial, etc, etc. But this is a fun group, focusing on rocking your shit with sheer vibrancy. No true music fan can pretend to be above that.