:: Marmaduke Duke - Duke Pandemonium

Marmaduke Duke

If the smiling faces of The Atmosphere and The Dragon weren’t on the cover of Duke Pandemonium you’d never guess that Marmaduke Duke was behind it. Throwing the musical frisbee and following it in a completely different direction, Marmaduke Duke have produced what is an unrecognisable but truly psychedelic album. ‘Everybody Dance’ doesn’t start so much as explode into your ears, setting the precedent for what are three minutes of pure, unadulterated dance pleasure. The jamming guitars, call and response vocals and random lyrics (“hot kitchen, fly fishin’blue dog canary”) sung in the kind of high squeal favoured by Scissor Sisters’ front man Jake Shears all make for musical ecstasy. The insane bliss continues in ‘Erotic Robotic’, giving you a taste of just how different this new Marmaduke Duke sound is. Extremely synth-heavy, the track has the same infectious frivolity and explosive energy of old but has been beefed up with some serious synthesizing and an absolutely genius bridge, which has been slowed to a repetitive chant you won’t be able to get out of your head for days-seriously. Duke Pandemonium comes to a close with ‘Je Suis Un Funky Homme’. Sounding strangely like the Spice Girls ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ (“swing it, shake it, move it, make it”) but with a very dirty message, ‘Je Suis Un Funky Homme’ is timeless and classic celebration of the ridiculous with some fresh electronic rock beats. Maramaduke Duke clearly knows what they’re doing - creating magic - and Duke Pandemonium is unquestionable proof of that. At times completely insane but always absorbing and undeniably brilliant, this is the sort of album you won’t be able to turn off and you won’t want to anyway.