To My Boy Messages by: Tom Perry Mon:13-Aug-07 Label: XL Year: 2007 WB rating 63 out of 100

Upon first listen this album was abysmal. Sitting through its entire 42 minutes was painfully excruciating. Then a few weeks later, planning to write a review full of negative thoughts, I realised that, as my head started to bob left and right and a cheeky grin came across my face, I was converted. Why the change? Because I’d figured out the music-meets-video game world that To My Boy created with Messages.

English duo To My Boy, consisting of Sam White, Jack Snape – and honorary third member: the computer (their ‘beautiful machine’) – are best described as a cross between Devo, Joy Division and the soundtrack to a ‘70’s sci-fi movie… after a whole lot of speed. While listening to this, you’d expect video clips featuring Tron-style neon light effects, or for it to be pumping along as an alternative soundtrack to Logan’s Run.

‘Tell Me Computer’ is the perfect opener for Messages: swift, aggressive and with a great sense of daring. The most obvious comparison here is Andrew WK’s hit ‘Party Hard’ from a few years back – like 2001: A Space Odyssey’s Hal 9000 receiving a lesson in naughties electronic music. Second track ‘Eureka’ provides a striking front-and-centre drumbeat to set up one of the most distinctive tracks on the album. The “Eureka” talked about here isn’t necessarily just the feeling of success. It’s the very distinctive metaphorical planet where To My Boy’s characters live – and this track’s lyrics read distinctively like a national anthem: “From Eureka we have grown/from terrible threads we were sewn.”

‘Outerregions’ provides the perfect follow on to ‘Eureka’. Leaving their planet behind, the boys take a trip on their synth-filled spaceship. It’s odd and cute, although it does sound distinctively similar to opener ‘Tell Me Computer’. ‘Talk’ is the slowest of Messages’ tunes. And whilst it’s not exactly going to set the world on fire with its beauty, it’s a refreshing, and needed, slowing down of the pace of this otherwise relentless record.

While the originality of the album is questionable, we’ve seen similar work from the Flaming Lips with their classic album Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots: techno-fantasy storytelling with a hero whose bravery is challenged, followed by a showdown with the evildoers. And from a musical point of view it’s hard to forget the twisted-yet-commercial sound of Regurgitator’s Unit. The synth vocals mashing over tightly packed tunes and triple-time drum beats work just as well here, and To My Boy are clearly having just as much fun as Regurgitator did in the ‘90s.

Messages is an album best described as a tool for the iPod generation: with little white headphones jacked in, travelling through an underground train line, or riding the suburbs on a BMX at breakneck speed, listeners’ every day situations will be brought to life by Messages to create a platformer-style video game reaching out of everyday life.