Lindstrøm Explores

BY Dimitri NasrallahPublished Jan 22, 2010

Don't count on Norway's premier disco revivalist Hans-Peter Lindstrøm to ever turn in the same record twice. "All the artists and bands that I really like do surprising stuff every time, and I guess I just copy their way," he says from his Oslo home studio. "But it's also about not getting bored myself."

Boredom is not an accusation that gets lobbed at Lindstrøm; he's kick-starting this decade by once again heading in a new direction. Real Life Is No Cool sees him pair up with occasional collaborator Christabelle for an energetic album of edgy, vocal-driven disco pop. The results are as fresh for today's dance scene as they are nostalgic for a time when club music wasn't as heavily vetted by categorization.

I've read in some of the Norwegian newspapers, some people wrote that it sounds like the future," says Christabelle. "I like that category." Real Life Is No Cool makes its case for a discofied future by drawing parallels to classic pairings such Giorgio Moroder and Donna Summer's Love To Love You Baby. That 1975 full-length combined Italian disco and American funk and soul that set the stage for North America's mainstream disco affair of the late '70s.

Lindstrøm has similar aspirations for Real Life. "I wanted to do something poppy and accessible. But I also wanted it to have disturbing elements, to be something more than just a regular pop album. I decided to use a lot of familiar elements from the history of pop music, it's clean and accessible and radio-friendly maybe, but there's also some weird stuff there."

Coming on the heels on 2008's epic Where You Go I Go Too and his stoner-disco collaborations with Prins Thomas, Real Life proves that Lindstrøm is always willing to go where he hasn't been before.

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