That summer, Two Door Cinema Club recorded their debut album in London’s Eastcote Studios with Eliot James, which they mixed with producer Philippe Zdar in Paris that fall. Fortunately, the gamble paid off – the band’s debut EP, Four Words to Stand On, was released in January 2009 by the hip French label Kitsuné to positive reviews and music blog buzz, which grew with the release of April’s single “Something Good Can Work.” The trio began playing as Two Door Cinema Club in 2007 and skipped going to university to focus on the band. Trimble and Halliday met in school, and then hooked up with Baird through mutual friends.

For all its glimmering synths and the robotic pathos of Taylor’s idiosyncratic vocals, this is a record with both heart and soul.Hailing from Bangor and Donaghadee, Northern Ireland, Two Door Cinema Club features singer/guitarist/programmer Alex Trimble, guitarist/singer Sam Halliday, and bassist/singer Kevin Baird. Lyrically, the band offer up some of their most poignant phrases to date: second single “Hungry Child”, a trance-y floor-filler, contains the plaintive, “Dreaming never felt so bad/ Lonely never felt so wrong before.” Over the shuffling beats of “Echo”, Taylor sings of leaving your regrets behind while seeming to understand the effort required to achieve this. Elsewhere, Rodaidh McDonald (The xx, David Byrne) reins them in, adding a succinctness to the euphoria of opener “Melody of Love”.

The late musician ( news of his death in Paris emerges just a day before this album’s release) had a free-spirited approach that suits Hot Chip on the psychedelic “Clear Blue Skies”, and there are nods to early Nineties French house via the glitchy funk and vocoder effects of “Spell” (an album highlight). Philippe Zdar – one half of the French duo Cassius and producer for the likes of MC Solaar and Phoenix – helps the band reconcile their house and hip-hop influences.

Hot Chip: ‘There’s a lot of pop music that’s really bland’.

2 door cinema club paris