During winter 2016, the French disco-electro duo of producers from Nancy released their highly anticipated EP « American Dream ». They won't tell you but their tracks were on the stove for quite a while. After the release of their two last EP, they decided to go back to the drawing board to come up with something different, something that would possibly please them doing it as much as it would please the audience listening to it, or that's what they thought. And that's what matters, right ?
In the end, after we listened to the CD a few times (because this time there is a hard case CD with a wonderful cartoon cover), it seems that it was a good idea they waited a bit before they released the EP : even though their two previous productions had good feedback overall, we can clearly hear that this time, they went the extra mile for each of the 8 tracks of this new EP to make all these original songs sound just great : funky, rythmic, clean sounding good sounding disco-electro tracks.
There is a good deal of variety too. For example, the song « American Dream » which features Donald's Trump samples is really catchy. The fast 80's retro style of the song with a modern flavour keeps you entertained until this amazing distorted guitar solo ala Van Halen, that really hits the spot. Songs featuring political speech are rather common these days but we definitely give a star to that special one from duo Ankoop.
Overall, the twins worked hand-in-glove to retrieve the original sound of Ankoop already present on their debut EP « Alone Together ». They took back the clock to bring the 80 retro style alive adding an extra unique modern touch to their productions. All the songs on this record, from intro to outro, are equally well produced and you can feel the effort and care they took to please their fans.
It is refreshing to hear this new gem after their last year « Choose your future » EP that took another artistic direction at that time.
In short, this last EP is a very good surprise, the french duo finally gaining ground to propose something a notch above their previous productions.
credits
released November 8, 2016
Music by Ankoop
Artwork by JP Dessaux with Charles Burns
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