Bis

Armed with just a few singles on tiny record labels and some comments about not "selling
out" and a vague "revolution," the Scottish trio Bis has caused a stir in the U.K. in the past
year. Propelled by two guitars and a synthesizer (a drum machine, canned keyboard bass
and occasional Ms. Pac Man effects thicken the sound), Bis are masters of inflamed rhetoric
and catchy sloganeering: "Sweetshop Avengerz," "Monstarr" and "Everybody Thi... More >

I'd take their rhetoric more seriously if it weren't so embedded in their aesthetic. The main function of their antibiz antisexism is clearly to drive grownups nuts, just like their high voices and their chanted choruses and their keyby guitars and their jingly catchiness, one song after another after another 18 strong until you feel like you can't stand to recognize another tune. Only you can; in the right frame of mind, in fact, you get off on it. Cheek, the English call such annoying charm. What the Scots call it is for Bis to know and us to find out. (Grade: A-)