Retail arenas and dead-eyed consumerist experiences are modelled at the core of community values. Towns revolve around their high streets, whole areas rely on the industrial-scale unit. Mozart Estate is having none of it. The composer at the heart of this indie-pop, synthpop piece is brushing off old members and bringing on new and withering pops at the consumer lifestyle. Wiggle through the opening track I’m Gonna Wiggle for that novelty pop defiance and a crushing ambivalence toward the streets upon streets upon streets, as Morrissey would no doubt call them, of shops. Human trash and levelling criticism at the high street appear an odd and dated choice considering they are as barren as The Specials’ Ghost Town, but Pop-Up! Ker-ching! And the Possibilities of Modern Shopping is behind the times anyway.
In equal measures the lacklustre soundtrack of Grease 2 and the wet blanket tones of a late-stage record from The Hoosiers, there is a sense of glee and fun within Mozart Estate. Much of it feels like indie pop ready-made for the little screen of daytime television for children. Had that been the aim then Pop-Up! Ker-ching! would have been some novel success. Instead, it tries its hand at political commentary on the likes of Relative Poverty, a breadline track set to a riff from The Wiggles. As grating as that sounds, the instrumental work flowing through is high-pitched, filled with upbeat interest and well-worked. Modern-day Agadoo horrors are found on the twee, upbeat whistling cockney abscesses of Lookin’ Thru Glass.
From there it all comes apart. Novelty is as novelty does. Brief charms are not fulfilling enough to hold firm for forty minutes. Smartphones, colloquial uses of the word “gaffe” and an unflinchingly dull bright and dark binary opposite on the light riffs of I Wanna Murder You and the attempt at changing pace on And Now The Darkest Times Are Here. Enough to drive a listener around the bend, as the latter half of Lookin Thru’ Glass manages, which straps itself to the twee annoyances of naming a track Poundland and having it sound like the beat was ripped from a Mario Party level. Frustratingly and interesting enough, Mozart Estate manage to blur their synthpop charms and their clear talent for instrumental sections into what is a sci-fi view of the modern shopping centre through a lense The Buggles would have snubbed their noses at.
One of the grand problems for Pop-Up! Ker-ching! comes from the asinine conclusions each short, one-trick track makes. Lifting some style from here or vague worry here that neither applies to the band nor makes much of an effort to convince the listener of some strife or interesting pointer. It all comes together artistically. Novelty indie pop tones are achieved and successfully so. Popping up with nothing much of uniqueness but still marking that ker-ching of the register as a transaction is made, it turns out the possibilities of modern shopping are loose, ill-styled and founded on a playing style from Mozart Estate that is worth exploring, so long as they get themselves out of Poundland-bashing children’s party synth pieces. Toothless pop politics round out Before And After The Barcode, and with that, Mozart Estate pack those bags of cushy wonders. Thank you for shopping, Lawrence.
