Bricolage sound a whole lot like
Orange Juice. You just can't escape it. It's in the arch lilt of the vocals, the angular jangle of the guitars, the skipping dance-punk beats, and the clever wordplay of the lyrics. A song like "Footsteps" could be slotted into a collection of Postcard-era
OJ and very few people would bat an eye. Why, then, does this blatant idolatry not completely wreck -- or even harm -- the band's self-titled debut, especially when the songs that don't sound like
OJ end up aping fellow post-punk heroes
Vic Godard and
the Subway Sect? Two important things save the day for
Bricolage. The first and most vital is the songwriting. Simply put, the band has whipped up a cracking batch of tunes here, "Footsteps" being the top of the pops but "Turn U Over," "Flowers of Deceit," and "The Waltzers" coming in dead close. They have huge hooks and singalong choruses, and sound like the kind of songs most bands would kill to write just one of in their lifetimes.
Bricolage have an album full of them. Second, they add a few twists to the
Chic-meets-
Velvet Underground formula that
Edwyn Collins and
James Kirk set in place for
OJ, whether it's the Motown backbeat of "Looting Takes the Waiting Out of Wanting," the
Spector-meets-
Strokes sound of "A Terrible Souvenir," or the warm,
Beach Boys-style backing vocals that pop up now and then. And something else that makes the album worth owning and the band worth following is the simple fact that
Orange Juice were a great band who came and went too fast, so borrowing their sound is much more forgivable than a band copping from a mega-band like
the Beatles or
Oasis. They will need to move on eventually, but for now
Bricolage are just fine doing what they are doing, and their debut delivers on the promise of their early singles and then some.
Edwyn (and
Vic and
James) should be proud.