CLONE QUARTET

WELL-OILED MACHINE is Clone Quartet's debut album [let loose on December 3 2007].
First reports are all very positive [see our first reviews below as we post them]. The CD is housed in a bespoke custom board pack design with a tear-off pull tag! Pre-order from our awesome labels:
SMALLTOWN AMERICA
TIGERTRAP RECORDS
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CLONE QUARTET ALBUM - 'WELL-OILED MACHINE' REVIEWS
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Clone Quartet already blew us off our perches with their debut single ‘Carousel’ which is coincidently the opening track on this fired up masterpiece of an album. The band have [over eleven tracks] have the pop stamina and song writing chic to impress even the most stubborn muso. Their style shifts between crunching rock, dance inspired indie pop and all out dance floor (future) anthems. Songs like ‘Young Foal’ twinkle with their retro synth sounds and skipping drums. The songs however have enough shifts to make them superior in every way. Young Foal takes a right turn heading into a more choppy and melodic chorus part. Acoustic guitars creep in under layers of drums synth and cubase trickery. Their general mood can shift from anywhere between cheery pop and dark, brooding & sexy rock n roll. ‘Twenty Five (Kane Was A Curse)’ is a perfect example of this with it’s heavy almost NIN style grind and fairground keyboard work. Vocally catchy and lyrically intriguing, the band comparing themselves and their work to a modern genius like Orson Welles, not in a pretentious way either, more the perils of keeping a steady flow of great work and not folding. Quality is key.
The most straight up dance moment is the bleepy and skipping ‘Need Your Love’ which also mixes some nice alterative rock moments and tongue in cheek lead guitar work alongside nasty electro pop beats and cheeky melodies. ‘Hold On’ is probably the heaviest moment on the album. Sounding desperate and forceful, Clone Quartet play the Pavement meets Sonic Youth Indie rock card which nestles nicely amongst their album which is both balanced and infectious. There’s enough variety to keep any listener involved. Their shifts, melodies and performance is excellent. The variety of music within ‘Well-Oiled Machine’ is immense. The title track again kicking into grinding grunge fueled dance music. They have the perfect blend.
The best track on the whole album by far is the amazing ‘Won't Somebody Please’ which has every element going to make it floor filler. The first time it caught me I found myself moving in ways I never knew I could. Whether it’s the squarks of guitar, the heavy and punchy drumming or the fact it’s so damn catchy, you can’t fail but fall in love with it. Clone Quartet have made an absolute classic of a debut album which really has depth variety and fun. This is all capped off with great production and song writing skills. ‘Well-Oiled Machine’ is indeed slick, sexy and friggin’ catchy. This album is an essential purchase this year.
Pete Stanley, ThePlasticAshtray.co.uk
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They've been through so many possibilities, but Clone Quartet have taken a wide tangent, back to the song, to the squelchy emotions, the fuzz and the fever. Sometimes we worried that they would never return home, that they'd be forever abstract or merely odd. But the adventures have been worth the chase because Clone Quartet have brought loads of savvy and style to their first album.
Thus, a tune like Need Your Love is all pained and uneasy. But the guitar lines are instantly attractive and the vocals work on many levels - like those wonderful old Cure and New Order records. You're not sure where the hurt ends and the irony begins, and you suspect that the author may not know either.
The synth lines are charmingly wonky and the piston whoosh of the drums sounds class. Sometimes the melody goes for a meander and in this respect you're reminded of the Pavement method. Twenty Five is the coolest example here.
It's a record to spend time with, to understand and to love those little peculiarities. Even so, the initial wallop of the title track is hard to argue with and the intro to Played To Death is a pesky bonus. All this and the best-dressed record sleeve in town. The Clones are unique.
Stuart Bailie, BBC ATL
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A co-release from the people that brought you the lovely Oppenheimer (Smalltown America), and the people that brought you Tiny Masters of Today initially (Tigertrap)
The innovative packaging (you have to rip it open and the damage is irrepairable, because it involves tearing a strip of paper off) wil have collectors either in tears or buying two copies (so they can keep a mint one in their cupboard)
Once you braved it and removed the paper, you will soon realise this act of destruction was well worth it, for this is a brilliant albu indeed. For it combines dancey drum machines with lovely indiepop tunes and rather distinct vocals (somewhere between Tim Wheeler and Davey McManus of Crocketts/The Crimea fame)
It’s pleasantly loud and energetic in places Twenty Five [Kane Was A Curse], and positively disco! In others (Need Your Love). The latter even has raygun noises, what more could you possibly ask for in a song?
In short, into this Well Oil Machine they put: electronic + fab vocals + some screaming + catchy tunes + noise = Sheer and utter genius
And don’t forget to check them out live at the Tigertrap Xmas party (for more info, see www.tigertrap.co.uk ) and catch them before they they catch on and everyone else does!
Julia Vergho, ishotthedeputy.com
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"Dance music is the new rock music is the new dance music. Somewhere in here lies Clone Quartet - a dapper bunch from Belfast who are a quartet. They appear not to be clones of each other, but whether they're clones of some other people, we don't really know. What we do really know is that 'Well-Oiled Machine' is a grammatically perfect title and a deadly efficient long-player.
They're up to that indie-rock-band-with-a-hint-of-electronics thing, which may sound like a half-arsed punt at the 'Nu-Rave' buck, but hear them out: Clone Quartet use their instruments to full potential, creating an intense dancefloor flavour, both bittersweet and dirty in their pop pretensions. Debut single splitters 'Carousel' and 'Played To Death' sounds like a dance-off between Arcade Fire and To My Boy taking place at a 7 year-old's birthday party after too much fizzy orange. They also sound a bit like VHS Or Beta in their 80s-humping Duran Duran camposity – just without the pinstripe blazer and roll-neck sweater combos. Meanwhile, 'Twenty Five' clangs like Hadouken! on the rare day on which they write a melody.
For something which seems the composite of many tried-and-tested formulae, Clone Quartet and their eleven offerings throw up something surprisingly fresh. Undying and unapologetic in its poppiness, 'Well-Oiled Machine' licks you behind the ears like an over-affectionate puppy. It makes you feel soggy and nostalgic, like Múm's Icelandic soundscapes being scythed by the surging, triumphant square wave of progress (see '10 Lies'). But secretly you love it to bits. And this kind of love is a very, very good feeling."
4/5
Richard Bendall-Jones, ThisIsFakeDIY.com
Buy limited CLONE QUARTET 7" or CD at TIGERTRAP RECORDS with PAYPAL --
CQ - 'CAROUSEL/PLAYED TO DEATH' REVIEWS
"A formidable Frankenstein’s musical monster of cascading rhythms, spiralling electro synth"… "Makes good on the promise of their exhilarating live show"… "Electronic blips and bleeps repeatedly stab at the listener like an army of midget robots with nail clippers"… "Reason enough to rhyme foursome with awesome."
Francis Jones, BBC Across The Line
"If Arcade Fire actually got around to writing a song with hooks and pop melody, or if they gave enough of a shit to want to move your feet at the same time as your heart and head, they would have a hard job competing with Clone Quartet."... "For those of us who know that writing pop songs is actually more challenging than 90% of what gets passed off these days as 'experimental', this single will be an essential purchase."
Paul Artrocker, Artrocker issue 62 - (read full review)
"A stomping beat that almost buzzes under the weight of its angry tension"… "Bring the (highly-tuneful, electro) noise! 8/10"
Ben Marwood, Drowned In Sound
[ More Single Reviews Here ]
CLONE QUARTET on BBC ATL TV, 22 FEBRUARY 2007