Death Disco: Mind Your Head

So, turns out that MNDR is pronounced ‘man-dar’. Soft, warm tears were wept all round as the disappointment began to sink in. We had a whole Minder riff all worked out, you know. The opening paragraph of this column would otherwise have been dedicated to a mid-market slice of 80s telly, which portrayed George Cole, used car salesman and prototypical Del Boy, being a bit of a rascal, while Dennis Waterman – the titular Minder – looked by turns stern and constipated and tisk tisked at his pal’s rascallyness. “Aarffahr!”, he would cry, “Aarffahr! Leave it aaht!”

Sigh.

Having cruelly dissociated themselves from the dodgy geezer demographic, MNDR are aspiring to far greater heights. Amanda Warner and Peter Wade are the duo behind the emerging New York dance outfit, and it hasn’t taken them very long to get a bit of momentum going. Warner has already lent her pipes to Mark Ronson’s lead single, the astoundingly decent Bang Bang Bang, from his forthcoming third album Record Collection. This comes less than two years after the release of C.L.U.B., a debut single that was followed by an EP released last April, E.P.E. MNDR cover quite a few stylistic bases – Warner has previously spoken effusively about her enthusiasm for German techno and early Detroit house – but chiefly cite Krautrock as a big influence. Warner’s catchy hooks and forthright vocals certainly lend MNDR an 80s synth-pop vibe, although their body of work doesn’t really fit any of those categories – square pegs and round holes come to mind here.

At this point, MNDR still seem to be in the midst of pinning themselves down to a signature sound. C.L.U.B., for example, boasts an ABC-style hook fed through a vocoder and a kazoo thing, with an otherwise scattergun array of midrange blips, tinny horns and buried coos. Meanwhile, I Go Away showcases a much leaner bit of songwriting, a downtempo effort with tribal kickdrums and washed-out Moog synthesizers that emphasise Warner’s wispy lamenting. They’re very different songs, basically.

Whichever direction they pursue in the end, their studio should certainly be well equipped to cope with whatever they throw at it. Warner is a self-confessed tech geek – the band’s official blog writes excitedly about obscure studio trickery like Shepards Tone, “a sound consisting of a superposition of sine waves separated by octaves.” Don’t pretend you know what that sounds like.

Elsewhere, MNDR are getting busy on other projects too. Warner is producing an album for fellow alt-pop New Yorkers Silk Flowers (a record that’s already been lain down, according to the band’s Twitter feed), and the band themselves are in the process of putting together their debut album, although there’s no news as to when that’ll be out. One to watch out for.