I have heard the album of the year.

[Starving_Artist]

Well said, VCO3.

Unfortunately, however, I do think they will be perceived as a novelty group by many people and I’m uncertain as to whether their music and visual style have sufficient ‘legs’ to overcome that and allow them a long-term career.

[Hunter_Hawk]

@VCO3

I absolutely reject the idea that the Pipettes are a gimmick group or novelty group, mostly on the basis that the songs are so amazing. Listen to “its hurts to see you dance so well” or “pull shapes” - two of the most ridiculously perfect pop moments of the past decade. I mean, those songs make the New Pornographers and the Magnetic Fields sound like freaking Bauhaus by comparison - pure pop perfection with some of the sweetest hooks I’ve ever heard.

[minor hijack]BTW, have you heard Daylight Basement yet? Because if there’s any recent album that I’d describe as “pure pop perfection”, it’s Any Kind of Pretty.[/minor hijack]

[TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW]

@Starving Artist

Well said, VCO3.

Unfortunately, however, I do think they will be perceived as a novelty group by many people and I’m uncertain as to whether their music and visual style have sufficient ‘legs’ to overcome that and allow them a long-term career.

I totally agree; the whole schtick may wear thin eventually, and the image may make it difficult for many listeners to give the band an unbiased listen. This generation of music listeners in particular, coming off of boy bands and the Spice Girls and so on, has a hard time dealing with any artist that presents a uniform “thing” or “image,” because we so closely relate it to novelty and prepackaged marketing.

But the band’s songs are just so ridiculously excellent that I think it will shine through for listeners that can get past it. If they just presented themselves as a regular indie rock band sans uniforms and names and such, people would love them in the way that they love unabashed pop groups like the New Pornographers.

[TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW]

I also want to point out, just in case nobody’s realized it, that this is a zombie thread that someone dredged up after I linked to it. If you look at the OP date, it’s almost exactly a year old.

As for the best album of '07, that remains to be seen; it’s been an astoundingly weak year for new records, and the ones that I was looking forward to (El-P, the Arcade Fire, the upcoming Mirah and New Pornographers) have been flops.