If deconstructing music sounds like a university degree gone bad, too often it, well, sounds like it too. There's a fine line between dissembling that unwieldy thing called a “song”, reconfiguring it against type and expectation and indulgent, ungodly wank. TTT (the band formerly known as Tic Toc Tokyo) sit firmly on the former side of the ledger with 'Animal', the first song under their new nomenclature.

TTT's former life as a choppy post-punk-disco band still resonates throughout 'Animal'. But it's confined more to the noisy clatter and bray of the execution, rather than the studied, intelligent design. 'Animal' opens with popping digitised rhythms and a backing of careening, sheet metal noise. Drums enter (“tribal” would be the most appropriate adjective if not for the dead flat sound) and then the one element that matters most: that riff. From an indeterminate origin (Bass on synth mod? Guitar? Keys? Keytar?), it's a loping, shifting, Sisyphean beast, sloping back onto itself, forever drawn back into its own circumlocutions. Its function is simple - it's the first dot in the pointillist painting around which the rest of the song coalesces, and fades.

If the debt to Talking Heads circa Remain In Light is obvious, TTT unconsciously evoke another ’80s reference with the welding arcs of noise that back the song, namely the flood of synths that form Vangelis' soundtrack to Blade Runner. The distant ambient warmth from the guitars means the production almost fights against itself: it's like looking at the fire from a distance and feeling the phantom heat (or watching the c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate if you'd prefer).

Lyrics are elusive. They’re part delivery and part deliberate, obfuscating production. The clearest words are a simple repeated invocation: “Get up.” For this reason 'Animal' seems less about deconstruction and more about reconstruction; the ability to break apart (whether under force or by design) and remake yourself anew, again.

So, ignore the name changes and paisely shirts but do elevate them on your “watch list”. Something's happening here.

by JP Hammond