The Thousands

Mimicry and facsimile reproduction are common and heavily coded devices in gallery art but not traditionally in music, where ‘rip-offs’ and ‘copyists’ are often exactly that and rightly derided for it. Band rooms aren’t used to ‘reading’ performers, or guessing they need to – though this is changing fast – so arty appropriation-play and contextualised copying usually goes over brilliantly, as ‘crazy’, when intended (Bowie, Ariel Pink) and awfully, as ‘derivative’, when it’s not (Interpol, Luke Steele).

It’s strange and refreshing for music not to aim to speak for itself, or for its creator, but for someone else altogether, as true homage or shadow experiment. So it is with Darren Sylvester’s debut album; a ghostly collection of synthetic recordings for Karen Carpenter, Phil Spector, remembered authenticity and pure pop fiction. Roxy Music, Japan, The Pretenders and The Cars all feature musically, as if on replay, but it’s Sylvester’s lyrics that crystallise his non-message most impressively:

‘ … You mimicked / ‘Cos you can’t believe … / That our dying moments / … are universal / Should words suggest you own life? / Or the life of someone in mind?’ (‘Telephone on the TV’).