We Started Nothing

Weeks and weeks in, several listens later and I still can't decide if `We Started Nothing' is the worst thing this over-educated pansy has experienced since Scouting For Girls pooed through his letter box. And this, I'm sure, is the real beauty and the sly pop genius of the Ting Tings debut album. Good Pop is a deceptively attractive creature in that it teases and flirts and nibbles away at you, one juicy bite at a time, never quite giving you enough but always keeping you coming back for more. Bad Pop however, much like an inexperienced lover, is far too over-zealous and just wants to roger you senseless with some borrowed moves, inevitably ruining your best sheets with it's messy, unfulfilled promises in the process.

Now the actual album - is it any good? Well, yes. It's good. It's annoying. It's catchy. It's not great, mind and the Ting Tings are by no means greater than the sum of their parts (even if these are parts 'borrowed' from just about every band to ever exist… more »

Weeks and weeks in, several listens later and I still can't decide if `We Started Nothing' is the worst thing this over-educated pansy has experienced since Scouting For Girls pooed through his letter box. And this, I'm sure, is the real beauty and the sly pop genius of the Ting Tings debut album. Good Pop is a deceptively attractive creature in that it teases and flirts and nibbles away at you, one juicy bite at a time, never quite giving you enough but always keeping you coming back for more. Bad Pop however, much like an inexperienced lover, is far too over-zealous and just wants to roger you senseless with some borrowed moves, inevitably ruining your best sheets with it's messy, unfulfilled promises in the process.

Now the actual album - is it any good? Well, yes. It's good. It's annoying. It's catchy. It's not great, mind and the Ting Tings are by no means greater than the sum of their parts (even if these are parts 'borrowed' from just about every band to ever exist between 1976 and 1996). With this in mind, I'm not going to bore you with a skull-crushingly tedious track-by-track analysis and how I cleverly spotted the influences (ZE Records - look it up) but, I will say: BE WARNED - there are a few duds here. A few half-formed ideas that don't quite ping in the way intended. Although, in the album's defence, I would say every classic pop debut worth a damn has housed a stinker here and there so it`s not really worth dwelling on. I certainly haven't got time for that kind of introspection and complex over-analysis of the collected works of the TIng Tings thus far. In the unlikely event that the Ting Tings survive to make another album I`m sure they`ll have perfected their technique. They obviously know this and, fully understanding the transient nature of pop and their place in the scheme of things too, just want to enjoy it while it lasts. So whether this is really pop pretending to be indie or indie pretending to be pop or even pop pretending to be indie pretending to be pop, we should just shut up and let IT go.

Darlings of the music press, a string of now legendary live performances under their belt and tipped by the BBC as the "sound of 2008" it's been quite a year for The Ting Tings.

Even without an album out, their shows have attracted the kind of "I was there" folklore that greeted the early performances of bands like Arcade Fire, so there's a lot riding on their debut, We Started Nothing.

The band may be just two people - Jules de Martino and frontwoman Katie White - but they sure pack a punch live. Question is will their infectious brand of fuzz guitar-driven power pop come across on record as well as it does live. There's no doubt that a huge part of The Ting Tings' appeal lies in the gusto White invests in every performance - utterly losing herself onstage, whirling around like a dervish, a spinning mass of limbs and blonde hair, thrashing away at a guitar, drum or whatever she can lay her hands on.

The album kicks off with Great DJ, the first single and classic… more »

Darlings of the music press, a string of now legendary live performances under their belt and tipped by the BBC as the "sound of 2008" it's been quite a year for The Ting Tings.

Even without an album out, their shows have attracted the kind of "I was there" folklore that greeted the early performances of bands like Arcade Fire, so there's a lot riding on their debut, We Started Nothing.

The band may be just two people - Jules de Martino and frontwoman Katie White - but they sure pack a punch live. Question is will their infectious brand of fuzz guitar-driven power pop come across on record as well as it does live. There's no doubt that a huge part of The Ting Tings' appeal lies in the gusto White invests in every performance - utterly losing herself onstage, whirling around like a dervish, a spinning mass of limbs and blonde hair, thrashing away at a guitar, drum or whatever she can lay her hands on.

The album kicks off with Great DJ, the first single and classic Ting Tings' fare. A driving drum beat, chopping guitar and White drawing the listener in with the mesmerising nursery-rhyme chorus: "Imagine all the girls, and the boys", interspersed with almost primal grunts and ending with the phrase, "the drums" repeated for what seems like an eternity.

It's an intriguing debut and establishes the Ting Ting's sound, lodging itself in your cranium and instantly recognisable within two seconds of the opening guitar chords when it comes on the radio. Now, that's classic pop.

As is track two, That's Not My Name, the forthcoming single, a slightly more complicated outing than DJ but no less infectious for that.

This time around White is frustrated by people - record companies, boys - forgetting what she is called and again the chorus, an almost yelping list of misnomers makes it another simple but effective pop song which is bound to be a hit.

The band have been compared to Blondie and the White Stripes, but their influences are far wider than both of those bands.

The thrashing guitar licks and vocal overload at times are reminiscent of 70s French punk rocker Plastic Bertrand and his UK hit Ca Plane Pour Moi.

But then Shut Up and Let Me Go comes on and its stomping disco bass-driven groove is akin to Chic's Le Freak.

If there's one thing that pulls the album together it's White's infectiously enthusiastic vocals, which light up every track.

Listen to her squealing "Ker-ching! Ker-ching!" during Fruit Machine - "You keep playing me like a fruit machine/putting in change systematically" - and I defy you not to be smitten.

In all, a great little pop album and the Beeb's prediction is on the money, they really are the next big Ting.