A little history lesson: the expression ‘freedom fry’ was the brainchild of US moron-in-chief George W, who with his sidekick Dick ‘Puppetmaster’ Cheney started a war under false pretenses that killed hundreds of thousands, destroyed an entire country, made the US hated the world over and incidentally also generously donated untold billions of our tax money to shady corporations like Blackwater and Cheney’s very own Halliburton. When some countries like France declined to go along with this insanity, W in his wisdom thought it would serve them right to have the word ‘French’ removed from the English language-or at least the American variant. And so ‘french fry’ became ‘freedom fry’. Ha! Showed them!
The one thing French about Freedom Fry, is singer Marie Seyrat. The story goes her and indie multi-instrumentalist Bruce Driscoll met at a film shoot for the former’s band. A connection was made and Freedom Fry was born.
With every new ‘indie’ release the term seems to lose a little more of its meaning, but if indie is threatening to become a dirty word then Freedom Fry are making it palatable again. Stylistically their sound leans heavily on the genre’s tried and true recipe, but they do it with flair, enthusiasm and considerable talent.
Title track “Friends and Enemies” is so catchy it should be against the law. The beat could wake the dead and the melody could make a tone deaf man sing. Heavy hitting, simple drums that walk the line between acoustic hip hop and funky indierock, melodic hyperactive basslines that percolate merrily along, and layers of jangly guitars and happy keyboards, all supporting multi tracked vocals from both Marie and Bruce chirping out sunny melodies that quickly lodge themselves into your inner ear.
“The Sea Invisible” veers into slighter darker territory, with heavily reverbed vocals, echoes of Joy Division, and dreamy shoegaze in the chorus.
“The New Crowd” sounds like cross between an outtake from Paul and Linda Mc Cartney‘s underrated ‘Ram’ album and a cellphone commercial. Breezy, summery, feather light, it gently bubbles along, reminding me of a bike ride through lower Manhattan on a sunny day with a cute French girl wearing a thrift store dress. Or something like that.
If I had to make comparisons to Freedom Fry I’d say Peter Paul and Bjorn; the same emphasis on catchy pop tunery, dressed up in various layers of indie hipness, with nods to shoegaze, the forever immortal melodic bass style of Joy Division and New Order‘s Peter Hook, and a childlike innocence with a slightly sinister tongue-in-cheek quality to it.
Which begs the question: Just what are these folks so happy about? Well, never mind: forget about corporate fascism and the digital surveillance state for a bit, and enjoy Freedom Fry and their cheerful, hip and slightly ironic indiepop. Maybe W was good for something after all.
[Rating:3.5]
Freedom Fry – All Of My Friends Are Ghosts Teaser Pt I from Freedom Fry on Vimeo.
