The day before the NYC-living French Kicks did a hang with Daytrotter, they played a street festival in Chicago in which ribs were abundant and the tangy sting of barbeque sauce was commingling with the night air as if the pits and spits were aroma candles. The group was en route to Fargo, N.D., but from the Windy City to here, Kicks bassist Lawrence Stumpf was stricken with rib fever since he opted not to sample the wares – going with a standardized pulled-pork sandwich instead. He needed barbeque, good barbeque. He would have had it for breakfast if the opportunity presented itself. And it makes sense. As I learned from the second season of Entourage the other day, you can’t get good bagels or good pizza in Los Angeles and from the French Kicks – on this afternoon – I learned that you cannot get good barbeque in New York City. Though we were just down the street from Jim’s Rib Haven, somehow the taste buds turned to pizza pie, as it always does, and Lawrence was fed. But as he left, I think I heard him talking about ribs again and you felt for the rest of the band, having to hear about ribs so often in such close confinement. Here’s what was evident when these five were here, they can turn a room into a smaller variation of home in no time. When they enter a place, they bring their town with them. They sweat cool – in sport coats and jeans – and that aloof, but sharp look of big city people. From the moment they were set up and playing, the studio did a 180-degree turn and stopped being Midwestern. It took on the characteristics of these smoky songs of emotional arm-wrestling and the conflictions that were highlighted by Nick Stumpf’s casual croon that’s more of a formal dinner voice, debonair and unassumingly rich, the ringing guitars customized by Josh Wise, the perfectly entrancing beats of Aaron Thurston and the sprinkles of miscellany from Kush El Amin. Simmer along to this welcome to summer session. – Sean Moeller

First song: Go On (French Kicks) [3.12MB] [5852 downloads]


– original version appears on “Two Thousand”

Nothing I write below has any validity whatsoever. The band said none of this. If you claim otherwise, it’s just simply not true “You’re just another friend/And I don’t need another friend.” This song – though it’s an unjust and unauthorized explanation that the French Kicks likely would adamantly debunk – is a nod to the great scene in the 1996 dark comedy “The Cable Guy,” in which Jim Carrey plays a smothering cable company employee named Chip Douglas, who believes Matthew Broderick will be best friends with him what for the gift of free cable. In a dramatic scene, like a parent explaining to a child why it’s wrong to pinch the family dog when it’s sleeping, Broderick uses a paraphrased version of the above line. Killer.

Second song: Knee High (French Kicks) [4.60MB] [9429 downloads]


– original version appears on “Two Thousand”

So I says to Nick, “I’m confused about what’s going over in “Knee High.” Is it bullshit? You must help decipher. Please.”
So Nick says to me, “It’s bullshit. No, just kidding. It’s a person. Like, how did that go
over? Knee high? Well, that’s not so good.”

Third song: Also Ran (French Kicks) [4.00MB] [5123 downloads]


– original version appears on “Two Thousand”

“Well if my head’s not right/Leave me in that hallway there/Where the whites all shine.” That is all.

Fourth song: So Far We Are (French Kicks) [3.68MB] [5823 downloads]


– original version appears on “Two Thousand”

This is the record’s single for which the band just shot a video for last week. I know nothing about the video, but it had better involve bears or I’m not watching. Just playin.’ From the very first listen of this song, it got me thinking about some of the great work that Supergrass did in relative American obscurity. It’s just one of 10 memorable cuts on this truly cool record.

Purchase French Kicks music at: Insound