Features | Concerts
The Pipettes
By Alan Baban | 2 October 2006
Little mermaids of the quicksand quagmire or nu-age MOR indie? A three-headed hydra beast out for your cojones? The Pipettes seem a divisive group, which is odd, because, by most people’s standards, they deal direct to the three base musical instincts of a) melody, b) counter-melody, and c) breasts. This year’s eponymous record housed enough flushes to convert most cynics, yet there are still those keeping a keen eye on their cards, before dishing out the judgmental dirt. I suspect one of these people is Alice. She may be the only girl at the Koko who isn’t sporting any polka-dot garb, opting for the demure pretence of an arch bystander, hands over balcony, one eye on the band, over-considering in disgust the throng of “disco plebes” down in the pit.
“The Pipettes have songs sometimes,” she concedes as support act the Hot Puppies drift offstage to muted applause, “but there’s nothing there but style. Have you heard that song, ‘School Uniform?’ I mean, are you going to argue that’s not novelty?”
Well, okay. She’s got me there. “School Uniform,” the final song of the night, is so self-consciously simple-minded as to be elevated to some plateau of post-post-modern deconstructionist avant garde. It’s like if the Stooges went twee and wore dresses. But isn’t that the point? Throughout their hour set, Rose, Becki and Judy implore the crowd to “dance!”, eschewing intellect for carnal pursuits. Which isn’t to say that the group lets technicalities slip -- each song is a choreographed melange of Cleopatra bebop and swayed synchronicity, proving the group to be very able performers, simultaneously hitting all the right notes and letting loose with some off-the-cuff remarks about their dwindling singles sales. I believe at one point I heard them use the word “Jazzercise.”
It’s an enjoyable show, but one that points to something of a conceit on the part of the audience. Sure, the material played is aesthetically fleshed out, but the songs lack the onion skin layers of anything Phil Spector produced in the 1960s. One begins to feel that, perhaps, the major reason why the Pipettes are riling up those who see past the novelty into their mercurial pop confections is because at the core is that very same novelty itself. The Pipettes present an alternative mainstream, rather than a mainstream alternative. Their success now is assured, but whether these songs and this performance are disposable or delectable depends on whether the group wants to expand into other frontiers, to eke out a fantasy pop niche with diminishing returns.
“The Pipettes have songs sometimes,” she concedes as support act the Hot Puppies drift offstage to muted applause, “but there’s nothing there but style. Have you heard that song, ‘School Uniform?’ I mean, are you going to argue that’s not novelty?”
Well, okay. She’s got me there. “School Uniform,” the final song of the night, is so self-consciously simple-minded as to be elevated to some plateau of post-post-modern deconstructionist avant garde. It’s like if the Stooges went twee and wore dresses. But isn’t that the point? Throughout their hour set, Rose, Becki and Judy implore the crowd to “dance!”, eschewing intellect for carnal pursuits. Which isn’t to say that the group lets technicalities slip -- each song is a choreographed melange of Cleopatra bebop and swayed synchronicity, proving the group to be very able performers, simultaneously hitting all the right notes and letting loose with some off-the-cuff remarks about their dwindling singles sales. I believe at one point I heard them use the word “Jazzercise.”
It’s an enjoyable show, but one that points to something of a conceit on the part of the audience. Sure, the material played is aesthetically fleshed out, but the songs lack the onion skin layers of anything Phil Spector produced in the 1960s. One begins to feel that, perhaps, the major reason why the Pipettes are riling up those who see past the novelty into their mercurial pop confections is because at the core is that very same novelty itself. The Pipettes present an alternative mainstream, rather than a mainstream alternative. Their success now is assured, but whether these songs and this performance are disposable or delectable depends on whether the group wants to expand into other frontiers, to eke out a fantasy pop niche with diminishing returns.