Album Review: Corridor – Junior

There’s a danger that all Francophone purveyors of slightly off-centre dreamy pop rock music may fall foul of the temptation for reviewers to make the easy Indochine comparison. Indeed, Montreal’s Corridor do evoke that languid, sophisticated Euro vibe in places on Junior, their 3rd album and the first ever Francophone release on Sub Pop. That such an august label committed to a band whose lyrics were likely to be incomprehensible to a substantial proportion of their potential audience speaks volumes about the quality of this band’s song-writing. It turns out that this an excellent call by the label because this would be a terrific album in any language. In fact, you have to admire a band so confident of their talent that they can afford to be resolutely true to their roots this way. Of course, Quebec is culturally resolutely French Canadian, with support and encouragement from regional government. It’s a big market in itself and nationwide, French-speaking (or singing) artists are disproportionately represented nationally in terms of domestic sales.

Against this nurturing background (or perhaps partly because of it), Corridor have created a determinedly idiosyncratic record that twists and coils. It hints at a rich vein of individualistic material that recalls the finest moments of the more angular proponents of the post-punk UK scene, such as Drums And Wires-era XTC and the poppier flashes of Wire circa A Bell Is A Cup. Junior, though, is thoroughly modern music. It is, at times, bewildering (the minute-long coda of Milan, for instance) and, at times, gorgeously textured. The bass is front and centre and the twin guitars shimmer and jingle in the mix. Lyrical incomprehension for this non-French speaker is irrelevant. The vocals evoke a wistful landscape where the content doesn’t really matter. Favourite tracks – the chiming, motorik groove of Grand Cheval and the driving yet dreamy Pow and Domino. Bonus points if you understand French, but a winner all round regardless.

Corridor are touring extensively in North America and Europe, with a London show at the Waiting Room, November 6^th. Junior is out on Sub Pop on October 18^th.