Junior Boys
Last Exit
Release Date: Sep 21, 2004
Genre(s): Indie, Dance, Pop, Electronic
Record label: KIN / Domino
Music Critic Score
How the Music Critic Score works
Buy Last Exit from Amazon
Album Review: Last Exit by Junior Boys
Exceptionally Good, Based on 3 Critics
Based on rating 9/10
Last Exit was preceded by two EPs strategically placed in the hands of critics/bloggers who were likely to be open to Junior Boys' sound. These releases offered a mishmash incorporating parts from numerous styles and countless artists while being evasive enough to prevent dismissive accusations of plagiarism. The slippery tendencies left the releases open to several elaborate rounds of "spot the influence" on the part of the writers, all of whom were successful to some extent.
Based on rating 4/5
Over the past 12 months, Canadian trio Junior Boys have generated more purple prose on internet blogs than anybody except Dizzee Rascal, but they couldn't be more different. While Dizzee's innovations thwack the listener over the head, the quietly radical music on Last Exit hovers around the edges of your eardrums. By yoking lonely vocals and shivery synthesizers to intricate, skeletal beats, Junior Boys variously suggest Talk Talk produced by Timbaland, Hall & Oates having a panic attack and a very sleepy Underworld.
Opinion: Fantastic
A midnight drive in your private limousine, through the rain-soaked city: neon lights reflect off the tinted windows and liquid patterns play upon the dashboard and the lap of your sweetheart beside you. In the hopelessly expensive stereo system, providing the soundtrack for this Don DeLillo-esque scene, is the wondrously suave electro pop of Birthday by Junior Boys. Seemingly arriving from nowhere (Ontario, actually), last year’s twin EPs Birthday and High Come Down garnered much critical praise from all quarters, but the Junior Boys remain relatively unknown, still a synthetic star in the ascendancy.
'Last Exit'
is available now