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P.D.A.
Rating: 3.9 | 0 User Reviews | Send to Friend
By Rick Sieber
As the fanboy side project of indie-rockers Will Schwartz (Imperial Teen) and Tomo Yasuda (Tussle), Hey Willpower manages to turn a genuine love of Top 40 dance-pop into an exercise in boredom. Navigating its own careful course between heartfelt homage and piss-taking send-up, P.D.A. somehow manages to avoid both of these potentially rewarding approaches in favor of a much more mundane take on contemporary R&B: not enough hooks and not enough comedy. With today’s recording technology it’s easier than ever to make interesting sounds and captivating beats, and Schwarz and Yasuda do have a certain facility in arranging these elements in an interesting way, but sounds and beats do not necessarily a compelling track make. The lightweight hooks are pleasing initially, but only a few tracks really go anywhere, and even fewer stand up well to repeated listens. Frustratingly formulaic, especially given Schwartz’s dependably inventive work with Imperial Teen, Hey Willpower bounce back and forth between a couple of chords per song (literally), spout out half-assed come-ons (tempered slightly with puns and cutesy pop culture references) and then set the controls to autopilot. The welcome exceptions (“Hundredaire,” “Not Trippin”) better attest to the duo’s love for the genre, while underscoring the fact that P.D.A. should have been so much better. (Tomlab)
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