Back in the late '90s, a trio of high-school students from Albuquerque called
the Rondelles presaged the entire new wave revival on several albums and EPs' worth of deliciously bratty two-minute pop-punk songs shot through with cheesy electronic keyboards. A decade later, a new batch of teenagers (this time from Minneapolis) have charted an extremely similar course on their debut album. At nine songs in around 28 minutes,
Sparkle Dust Fantasy is a brief, breathless run through herky-jerky dancefloor beats, old-school synths, stabbing rhythm guitar parts, and male-female vocals courtesy of guitarist John Pelant and bassist Grace Fiddler. The lyrics are deliberately, playfully simplistic, occasionally delving into semi-rapped chanting on songs like the dancefloor parable "Confessions." Pitched somewhere between a less carnal
CSS and a less manic
Be Your Own Pet,
the Battle Royale's music doesn't offer much in the way of originality, but
Sparkle Dust Fantasy delivers its new wave dance-rock with enough giddy energy to get across regardless, and at its best, like the spirited, snarky opener, "You'll Be Fine," it's tough to beat. The kids, indeed, are alright. ~ Stewart Mason