Just over a week ago Washington-birthed electronica duo Benoit and Sergio had what may yet prove to be their decisive break with a guest slot on Radio One’s populist Friday night dance show, headed by Pete Tong. Pleasingly, instead of choosing to play a set of crowd-pleasing floor-filler “anthems”, the duo that now split their time between the US capital and Berlin plumped for several left of field tunes including a gorgeously restrained cover of The Replacement’s Swingin’ Party performed by London’s Kindness.
The choice of track says a lot about the sensibility of Benoit and Sergio’s own music. The Replacements were notorious punk hedonists who partied with abandon and would more often than not perform live on a cocktail of drugs, but their songs always suggested an emotional depth belied by their drunken antics, and in a different way the duo’s warm, danceable tunes display the same aesthetic. Whilst they would not be out of place on any discerning clubber’s dance floor, Benoit and Sergio claim that their songs are designed to tell stories from different characters perspectives; these stories more often than not carry a level of melancholy not displayed by the actual music. The beautiful refrain on What I’ve Lost, perhaps their best track yet, is a case in point, but deserves hearing in it’s own right, rather than having me spoil it for you.
After putting out a spattering of releases on Vision Quest, the pair now find themselves at home on James Murphy’s (whose own work with LCD Soundsystem suggests the same hedonism/sensitivity conundrum) DFA label, with their latest release being a double a-side, Principles/Everybody. Of the two tracks, Everybody is by far the strongest, displaying a funkiness previously suggested by their cover of Daft Punk’s Around The World.
With each successive release so far, Benoit and Sergio seem to have taken a step forward in producing intelligent but club-friendly music. Hopefully the guiding hand of James Murphy will now steer the duo towards similarly exciting pastures.
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