Young rock stars just want to party

Published on Wednesday 11 July 2007 12:13

Cajun Dance Party ***

Cabaret Voltaire

IF you're good enough, you're old enough - that's one way of describing latest indie-rock upstarts Cajun Dance Party. Young, dumb, and full of boisterous energy this five-piece from London, who have just finished sixth-form and still not old enough to drink alcohol, were keen to prove last night at Cabaret Voltaire, that, when it comes to genuine talent, age is no barrier.

Led by fluffy-haired singer Danny Blumberg, the band - Robbie Stern (guitar), Max Bloom (bass), Will Vignoles (drums) and token female member Vicky Freund (keyboards) - has been on a bit of a rollercoaster journey since forming early last year. Debut single, The Next Untouchable, was lauded by NME as Single of the Week back in April, radio's Steve Lamacq said their demo was his "top demo of 2006", and were hailed as one of the best bands at this years Glastonbury. Better yet, they've just signed a record contract with XL Recordings. Not bad when you consider the only time the band could tour was during school holidays.

Support act, Icelandic brats Jakobinarina (aged between 14-18), though, warmed things up with an explosive set. The band's lead singer has a hair cut that once belonged to 80s band Flock Of Seagulls, some of them wore a T-shirt that said "Kill All" on it, and when they weren't flailing their limbs all over the place, sounded a bit like early Brit Pop bands only with scary sounding synths plastered all over every song. Clearly better than the average school band at least they'll have something to write about when they return to school and their teacher asks them to write an essay on what they did during the summer.

Which leads us to Cajun Dance Party. Neither a Cajun band nor a dance band, the Cockney quintet do like a party, and kicked off their set with a delicious piece of melodic nonsense, as singer Blumberg wandered around the stage banging a walking-stick against the floor. Dressed in a dusty suit jacket, Blumberg has a contemporary sounding voice: he could easily deputise as the singer for My Chemical Romance or a Cure tribute band, and sings in a clear, poetic style. His over-emotive antics rarely got any more rebellious than pulling down the Cabaret Voltaire backdrops, and instead of handing out flowers to the Edinburgh audience he so clearly adored, chose instead to hand out coat hangers, presumably, nicked from the dressing rooms.

His band meanwhile, played so tightly they could probably turn on a five pence piece.

Musical influences ranging from The Beatles to Arcade Fire are worn clearly on the sleeve, tunes like Colourful Life and Time Falls no better or worse than anything Snow Patrol are churning out these days. But that was before encoring with the aptly titled The Next Untouchable. While the biggest disappointment of the evening was that the band barely played longer than 35 minutes, the upside is we should be hearing a lot more from this talented bunch in the next couple of years.

You might want to tell your younger brother and sister about them.