When the Angels Play Their Drum Machines

File under 'discoveries'

Sometimes, I get to a point where I'm bored with music. Roughly 60,000 individual songs reside within my household. At least. Honestly, we lost count years ago. And I still get bored, I feel like there's nothing new under the sun to pique my interest.

So much of what I listen to comes from references. These referrals so often come in the form of music that people I respect and/or trust will play whilst DJing. There are hundreds of bands/artists I've been turned on to in this way. For an example: The Saints, The Troggs, Chrome, Dead Boys, and many, many other 'the' bands as well as others.

A few months ago, a DJ I know who's more or less an acquaintance mentioned the British band Hefner. 534n Melee makes some of his own music (which I highly recommend) and you can check that out here. It's a music of the electro variety, and it's well done. He's also pretty good at skewering the hipster scene that he caters to while DJing.

Anyway, in the past, the music I've discovered through fellow DJs has been mostly older. It's the things that I should have noticed along the way, but had yet to discover. In the case of Mr. Melee, it's often more recent or even very new music.

I remember Hefner's first album, it was called "Breaking God's Heart." I remember it because the cover art was colorful and I kept seeing it in used bins at various local record stores. But I never picked it up.

To tell you the truth, if I had picked it up back then, I can't say whether or not I would've been into it. Chances are, I would've been bored by the record. My mind was steadfast on power pop and punk rock at the time. At this point, I've only heard about half of the album but I love it. I'm still sinking my teeth into these guys. The songs I've heard from this first record are folk on a par with earlier Elvis Costello. Or at least, that's the sound. The wit is closer to Billy Bragg and Jarvis Cocker (Pulp).

I'm just now (today, in fact) settling into their second album, "The Fidelity Wars" from 1999. I've listened to it in it's entirety one and a half times. So far, it's turning out to be a classic breakup record. As I'm sure you know, that's a topic that makes for some of the best songs/records of all time. This time around, their sound picks up a bit more. No matter what, the focus is always singer Darren Hayman's vocals and lyrics. That's a constant that I've noticed all throughout the band's career. But the songs are faster-paced, and there's more instrumentation. The Elvis Costello meets Billy Bragg sound is still there, and I think that's what pulled me in being a big fan of the two Brits.



I should give you a disclaimer right about now that if you can't handle somewhat nasal vocals with a British accent (no Cockney patois), then Hefner may not be right for you. I should also tell you that "The Fidelity Wars" is probably the best place for you to start if you're interested in the band.

In 2000, they released "We Love the City," where their distaste (and disgust) for London was laid bare. I don't know how much modern British music you've heard, but I've definitely noticed this as a recurring theme. Yet they stay there...



Their passion for hating Margaret Thatcher, their country's Parliament's constant tyrannical missteps, the royal family, and everything ugly about London is the theme here. But it's always done with cocky humor. That's the Jarvis Cocker coming out.

The last studio album from Hefner was "Dead Media," which came out in 2001. At this stage in their evolution, the band suddenly took a lo-fi analog electronic approach. By 'lo-fi' I don't mean gritty, just analog. There are samples and and drum machines and keyboards, oh my! For the ADD-afflicted mind, this is probably the easiest Hefner album to get into. Most of the songs are much more upbeat than in the past. But that wry humor and sarcasm is still there in the lyrics. The urban-folk poet sound is still very much alive in "Dead Media."

That's it, that's my brief bio on the English band Hefner. It's somehow comforting to come across bands like this...to know that there always is something new.

If you're interested in the band, I recommend checking out their site, which you can get to by clicking on any of the album covers above.