Blancmange - Useless - new single by CherryRedRecords

Blancmange Announce New Single – ‘Useless’
Release Date: 11 May, 2015, Cherry Red Records
Live shows: 15 & 16 May, Red Gallery London

MOJO MAGAZINE 'Instantly memorable melodies. Wonderful pop songs. Music Pop Art has seldom been as good.' ****
CLASSIC POP: BEST NEW ALBUM OF THE MONTH: 'Confirms Blancmange's capacity to astonish.' ****

ARTS DESK: 'This collection is certainly darker . . . 'Like I Do' is a brilliant pop highpoint, drenched in the passing orange glow of a streetlight at 2am.' ****

LOUDER THAN WAR: ‘This could be their finest album to date.' 9/10

ELECTRONIC SOUND MAGAZINE ‘Semi Detached is a journey downwards, both through the earth and through a psyche. This is an album of subterranean spaces... Its depths will have you thinking about it for days. There’s just so much here.’

UNCUT MAGAZINE: 'Blancmange have seldom been hipper.' ***

VIVE LE ROCK: 'Arthur's emotional vocals reflect intense personal words, meshing the melodic moody music magnificently.' 9/10

Q MAGAZINE: 'Still in strong voice, Arthur’s spare, pop-savvy synth tracks are a fitting canvas for his absurdist narratives.' ***

RECORD COLLECTOR: 'This is a darker, icier project than any Blancmange have previously served up. Imagine a contemporary Depeche Mode blended with a uniquely British, Jarvis Cocker-esque twist . . . This deserves a wider hearing.' ***

‘Everybody loves you, useless as you are’
Blancmange’s latest single is 3 minutes of electronic pop with a deadpan, ironic twist in the lyric. It’s part withering put-down; part brutal self-assessment – after all aren’t we all that person at some point? And yet the tune carries a sense of whirling wonder that not only do some people seem to ‘get away with it’ but also sometimes, if we’re lucky, we do too. By the end of the track it feels like we’ve just experienced a jab of sarcasm and a wistful celebration.

Blancmange’s new album, Semi Detached is full of these bitter-sweet moments. Released on the 23 March 2015, the tracks are shot through with lyrics inspired by Neil Arthur’s instinct for surreal juxtapositions and abstract wordplay.
The eight minute opener ’The Fall’ sets the tone with its imaginative mix of the London tube map, The Fall (the band), Heaven and Hell, suicide, ghostly (inner) reflection and rain-soaked romantic imagery. The synthesizer melody is lightly done but the narrative is one of broken hearts, tragedy. . . . and The Fall: ‘I went to see them many times,’ says Arthur. ‘I sent Mark E Smith our first EP and we exchanged a few letters, his being ones of humorous encouragement.’
‘I Want More’ is a cover of Can’s only ‘pop hit’ from their 1976 album Flow Motion. The repetitive refrain of the title initially comes across as joyous, the soaring melody and rousing chorus of voices conveying a celebratory hedonism, but the song takes on a more foreboding edge against the backdrop of 21st century excess and its darker implications: ‘Don’t care if I break the law/I want more and more and more . . . ‘

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