Heartbeats

It's good to dance! Grum is Graeme Shepherd. He comes from Scotland and makes very good dance music. Truth-be-told it's quite simple fayre but the beauty of some of the best music to hurl yourself about to lays in its simplicity. Mr Shepherd understands this very well. His creations are relatively uncluttered. Four-square beats, shiny synth melodies, undemanding singalong vocal contributions. What more could you want? A perfectly-formed, mindlessly happy, soundtrack for the summer. Sangria, six-packs and sunshine! With an eye turned craftily backwards to the disco-ball euphoria of the eighties and nineties and a deft grasp of the gyratory needs of clubland's current fast and furiously fickle appetite, 'Heartbeat' is a cunning and well-constructed manifesto for discerning modern movers and shakers. There really isn't a duff tune in the bunch as long as you're open to the possibility of simply enjoying yourself. If, however, you are in search of music which explores and stretches the boundaries of what it is possible to achieve in the medium of sound and rhythm then you may need to look and listen elsewhere. 'Can't Shake This Feeling' sounds like a familiar old sweater whose wool has been unraveled and re-knitted to wrap around a brand new, slimmer, fitter, contemporary silhouette. Delightful! 'Runaway' gives a respectful nod and wink towards Giorgio Moroder. I half-expected Mme Summer to chime in at any moment. (She doesn't!) Title track 'Heartbeats' is chock-full of wonderful bleeps and twitterings. The big anthemic synth chords (even though you've heard their like a hundred times before) are so guilelessly constructed that it is virtually impossible to resist the urge to wriggle! 'Turn It Up' gets all tangled up in the skirts of late-eighties Madonna and lives to tell the tale. A convincingly cheeky confection. Oh my! 'The Really Long One' really is very difficult to stay still to! The slippery disembodied voices and deliciously anachronistic electronic string arrangement weave in and out of the big, bad and highly infectious synth-bass and drum motif, adding depth and atmosphere to one of the album's most satisfying compositions. Final track 'Someday We'll Be Together' bumps and grinds like a wildebeest in heat! (Hold that thought!) A powerful mid-tempo conclusion to a thoroughly enjoyable collection. (I'm just loving the robot-world vocal treatments!)