Dolly Rockers

THE DOLLY ROCKERS VIDEO - JE SUIS UN DOLLYIntroducing Dolly RockersThe best pop music happens during the worst of times. The upside to a looming recession, global conflict and five year-olds mugging you for your mobile, is the return of music that’s bright (in both senses of the word), brash, slightly deranged but irresistibly catchy. We believe the big papers are calling it ‘wonky pop’. The Dolly Rockers themselves would probably call what they do ‘drunk disco’, but we’re not sure that’ll catch on.“Pop on their own terms”Along with bands like Alphabeat and The Ting Tings, Dolly Rockers belong to the generation who want pop back on their own terms. A generation who make no distinction between Spice Girls ‘Wannabe’ and Blur’s ‘Girls & Boys’ – both classic and defining pop records that, in their own way, said everything to you about your life, but with a tune you could sing when you got pissed with your mates.Sophie (20 years old, northern, tiny): “We don’t feel we have much in common with manufactured girl bands. Pop music to us is Arctic Monkeys, Kate Nash, Mark Ronson…” Lucie (20 years old, southern, insomniac): “I loved Blur and Pulp when I was younger. At the time it was called ‘indie’, but it really was just pop music.” Brooke (20 years old, northern, lairy): “The Spice Girls were great too. I hate bands that are just clones or puppets, who do what they’re told. I likeDolly Rockers formed two years ago, having come to London to sing and escape…Sophie: “I went to of one of the roughest schools in Leeds. I knew if I stayed I’d just be hanging round the same places with the same people for the rest of my life.” “We sing in our own accents”Musically, Dolly Rockers pilfer from the past with glorious, post-mashup, pre-clubbing anthems with enormous, instantly hooking choruses (and a healthy amount of amazing, whizzing electro noises.) Lyrically, the Dolly Rockers take on ‘orange girls’, the z-listers and the WAGs, on songs littered with chips, energy drinks and the frustrations of living at home.The band have no time for fillers or soppy ballads. ‘Je Suis Une Dolly’ is their irresistible, tongue-in-cheek theme tune (though we’re not sure whose cheek). ‘Bang Bang’ is a declaration of sexual independence, set to the sounds swirling in a hung-over head, after an 80s disco. And ‘North Vs South’ is a roaring celebration of the Midlands (no really), updating the Britpop blueprint with a song that sounds like Alex Turner’s kid sisters.Brooke: “We’re only young so we’ve not got any heartbreak stories to tell you, we’ve just got stories about nights out in pubs.” Lucie: “We sing in our own accents because we’re singing about our own lives. Our songs aren’t about love, more about snogging.” Sophie: “We write songs about the things that happen to us and the things we talk about. ‘Champagne Shirley’ is about girls like Jodie Marsh: “She hires limousines/making massive scenes/just to go to clubbing”. Brooke: “We hate glamour models. It’s unnecessary and makes girls look cheap.”“No footballers”But isn’t it inevitable that when Dolly Rockers become successful, they’ll all end up in gossip mags with footballer boyfriends and cosmetic surgery?Lucie: “I don’t like boobs. I think girls look nicer when they have no boobs.” Brooke: “No footballers! That’ll be a t-shirt slogan for Dolly Rockers.” Lucie: “Nowadays, you can be famous for falling out of Chinawhite, drunk. We don’t want to be celebrities, it’s meaningless. But maybe it’s changing. Maybe people who actually do something can be stars again.”