Ever since the dance rock craze peaked in 2004 and 2005, some of the leading bands of this musical movement have lost some of their excitement. Much like grunge in the early ’90s, many once-revolutionary bands such as Stellastarr, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, The Futureheads and the Kaiser Chiefs don’t sound as explosive as when they started. Even the great Interpol released a less-than-stellar third album.
However, one up-and-coming dance rock artist, Kenna, has released an album worth rocking out to. His new LP, “Make Sure They See My Face,” features some of the most groove-worthy rhythms, guitars and drums that I’ve ever heard in a dance rock album.
Although the graffiti-stained cover and the liner notes are reminiscent of a rap album, the album opener “Daylight” begins with a gorgeous synthesizer and a steady, thumping snare.
The second song, “Out of Control (State of Emotion),” is one of the best rock songs I’ve ever heard. It starts with a loud hip-hop beat and bass before exploding with synthesizers and cymbals as Kenna sings, “This shit is out of control/It’s out of control/And I don’t care what is happening.”
The Ethiopian-born singer/songwriter sings like Robert Smith from The Cure, and he performs almost all the music, playing the guitar and drums. It helps that the album was produced by the Neptunes, a pair of superstar producers who have a knack for creating powerful beats and otherworldly synth lines.
Kenna and the Neptunes really change things up with “Loose Wires/Blink Radio,” throwing in thumping disco beats and bizarre video game sound effects that sound like they came straight from Beck’s 1999 album “Midnite Vultures.” Although this combination doesn’t sound like it would work, it sounds amazingly good.
The album peaks with the awesome song “Sun Red Sky Blue,” on which Kenna combines jungle techno beats with electric guitars as he sings, “Give me your sun red sky blue love/I’m falling into you.” To top it all off, he adds a blaring sythesizer effect straight out of a Killers song.
Kenna isn’t all about loud guitars and fancy sound effects, either. Like a chameleon, he switches gears again with “Baptized in Blacklight,” which features a clean guitar riff that sounds beautiful as he soulfully sings the chorus like Bono from U2: “Still, when the sun is out/And the night is all a haze/Let the flood come down/And wash all over me/Baptized in blacklight.”
However, Kenna can get a little too sentimental at times. Most notably, “Phantom Always” is musically overblown and features lyrics that sound like they belong in a Christian rock song instead, particularly the lines, “Every move I make in time and space/I know you’re there in the shadows/Every burden that I try to shake/I know you’re there.” There’s even a mysterious sythesizer dulcimer, as if to give listeners a sense that the Holy Ghost exists in the song.
Despite this disappointing song and the similar track “Still,” though, Kenna’s “Make Sure They See My Face” has some of the best dance rock I’ve ever heard. The beats are heavy and thumping, the guitars are loud and the synthesizers sound like something from “Star Trek.” It’s truly an example of dance rock done right.
