Kaiser Chiefs - Ducks

The Guardian 60

(Polydor)
Their singer is a judge on The Voice UK and parochial indie culture is dead, but there are enough hooks here for them to get away with it

Frequently while listening to Duck, you remember: this man judges a TV singing competition. It’s not that Ricky Wilson was indie’s greatest singer, but he knew what to do with his voice, a bawdy, beery thing that could definitely talk you into another pint. But now he’s a shiny-floor entertainer, parochial indie culture is dead, and Wilson sounds adrift. He won’t find an identity in the painfully strained Golden Oldies, a shouty song in sharp contrast to its broody sentiment. Nor in Don’t Just Stand There, Do Something, an unnervingly edgy vaudevillian number, Wilson bellowing about a girl locked in the bathroom while the sounds of knives being sharpened slice through the mix.