Over the last decade, Super City has steadily discovered its metier in sticky pop hooks, mercurial arrangements, and live shows that are equal parts calculated performance art and ecstatic dance party. Their recently released 'InTheMidnightRoom' is a stellar collection of songs that fuse at least six decades of pop into a thrilling album.
While every Super City song contains multitudes, the pop instincts that they’ve honed over the last decade are front and center on several tracks. “Getouttahere” kicks the album off with swaggering fuzz guitars that wrangle glam and new wave influences into a giddy rush, capped off with a classic stuttering vocal hook. “Hang Up” cleans up nicely with rubbery Nile Rogers guitar riffs and sleek falsetto before the song absolutely derails itself with a stomping road block of a chorus. There are bright wisps of Stevie Wonder, Talking Heads, Prince, the 1975, and St. Vincent in their best pop songs, but Super City so completely chops and screws its influences that InTheMidnightRoom always feels crisp and forward-thinking.
Even though Super City’s pure popcraft can’t resist sneaky detours, InTheMidnightRoom also features more challenging fare. “Departed”’s adventurous melody somehow splits the difference between McCartney sweetness and Yorke queasiness. “Fear with Passion” sabotages the album’s dance party with evocative soundscapes and eerie detuned piano figures. In the album’s final stretch, “Stitch on Your Side” builds a compelling foundation of filtered guitar and sophisticated contrary motion progression before surrendering to the catharsis of “Hey Jude”-style nah nahs. In the Midnight Room’s final word, though, goes to “Light of the Moon,” a sparse, beautiful composition that recalls nothing less than Brian Wilson’s more fragile moments. Knowing that the wide range of these new favorites will be elevated yet further by the band’s remarkable live shows is exciting. With InTheMidnightRoom, Super City have certainly propelled themselves closer to perfecting their own genre of infectious future-art-pop.
