Yahoo! Music Review

Released on 12/05/08
Label: EMI

So now Hot Chip have developed a fascination for old Stones riffs? Or is that Depeche Mode records? Or The Flaming Lips? Whatever it's meant to be, the only thing that's clear is that "One Pure Thought" is painful listening. "If I could have just one pure thought", laments Alexis Taylor as the layers of guitars, beats and bleeps - like the unlikely genres they've been borrowed from - crash and clash beneath him in unholy discord. If only.

"One Pure Thought" is, of course, the ultimate Hot Chip conundrum. Is it musical triumph or disaster? With the backdrop's chaos and dysfunction seemingly sympathising with the lyric, this soundclash could be Hot Chip being supremely clever, creating the perfect musical soundscape for the sentiment. Yet it seems in their quest to push post-ironic boundaries they've finally found the point where it stops being funny and clever and is just rendered irritating.

    by Dan Gennoe