This Is Happening [Import]

James Murphy has quite the resume! His 2004 debut and 2007's Sound of Silver really challenged the boundries between traditional electronic music and the triple A alternative music experience. He has such a unique style that is ever so present in Is This Happening. The album starts with a bang, Dance Yrself Clean is 9 minutes of Murphy's creative juices flowing and setting the stage for the rest of this terrific album. Drunk Girls is a comical perspective of a night out of partying and drinking (not unlike his past works). One Touch is an irresistable party number, All I Want is sweet and adds weight and emotion to the album. I Can Change is a terrifically well writtin masterpiece, and Home is one of the best concluding tracks I can remember since the Radiohead days. Have I said enouph?

New York's LCD Soundsystem has been artfully twiddling with musical conventions for several years now; it has pretty much become the benchmark for consciously hip electro-punk.

This Is Happening follows 2007's much-name-dropped album The Sound Of Silver and further affirms the fact that this is more of a clever `project' than a band.

Main man James Murphy dominates the songs (typical sleeve credits include `James Murphy: drums, Yamaha CS60, Roland TR-606, noise, vocals, claps, glockenspiel...') and plays fast and loose with a swathe of genres.

What's surprising, though, is that all this immaculate coolness is so fantastically easy to warm to.
This Is Happening is purportedly a swansong for LCD Soundsystem.

If that does turn out to be true, then Murphy has gone out with a bang and a starburst of future possibilities opening up through the à la mode DFA record label he co-founded.

Its nine fairly lengthy numbers bristle with invention and the instinctively snappy appeal of classic pop.

Murphy has always spiked his tunes with self-effacing humour (right back to 2002 single Losing My Edge) but here it sounds sharper and brighter than ever, from the deliciously louche rock groove of Drunk Girls (`Just 'cuz I'm shallow doesn't mean that I'm heartless') to the sweet and sour romance of I Can Change and All I Want.

He's still a tricky, contrary creature - on You Wanted A Hit he protests `but maybe that's not what we do'.

Maybe not, but he is capable of turning on a lot of new listeners beyond a knowing niche crowd.

Finally, LCD Soundsystem sound like an in-joke that everyone gets - and that really is happening.
Sound Of Silver

Totally disagree with reviewer that gives this album 1 star. The only track on this album that I wasn't a fan of is Drunk girls. This album takes a couple of listens to warm up to it, but thats the same as a lot good music. I have their first 2 albums and this one is a little different. 4 and half stars.