Pots, Pans, & Rock ‘n’ Roll

For all the cynics and disparagers believing that innovation and creativity are all but dead in popular music, forgive the cliche, but think again. British duo Galia Durant and Carim Clasmman, collectively known as the indie-electro group Psapp, are ready to raise a few eyebrows with The Only Thing I Ever Wanted. “Clunktronica,” “toytronica,” clink-clank-music” — OK, we made up that last one — the words used to describe Psapp not only add to our lexicon, but describe to a tee Psapp’s organic and strangely beautiful sound.Imagine if you will a more innocent, charming, and sultry Dido backed by a small army of Keebler elves grinning from ear to ear as they turn a knob, crank a handle, swish some water, and pull a lever all in complete, orchestrated genius. If you can visualize such a scene, then you can imagine what Wanted sounds like. For her part, Durant can easily meander from heady and defiant on tracks such as “Hi” and “The Words,” to sincere and unguarded on “Tricycle,” singing “You know and I know / How we work and how we hope / We get all tied up.”

Having already garnered some fame with “Cosy in the Rocket” as the theme song to the hit show Grey’s Anatomy, Durant and Clasmman work together brilliantly on The Only Thing I Ever Wanted. It’s an auditory version of the division of labor. Keyboards, piano, violin and xylophone are but a few of the instruments paired up to the clinks and clanks of everyday, idiosyncratic bits of noise. This amalgam of sounds atop Durant’s vocals provides for rich and textured bossa-nova-meets-pop-folk ditties that not only entertain, but astound.