Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History

Two Door Cinema Club are three young men from Bangor and Donaghadee in Northern Ireland. With a neat line in twitchy indie-pop, and at least one eye on the dancefloor, they share common ground with Foals, Delphic, Friendly Fires, Klaxons and Bloc Party. Indeed, they’ve already shared stages with the former two, and this debut opens with what sounds like the same note that kicked off Bloc Party’s Silent Alarm.

It may not be a particularly inspiring lineage, and it would be wrong to claim that TDCC are bringing anything particularly new or innovative to the table, but they do possess an infectiousness and effervescence that’s hard to shake. There’s none of Bloc Party’s glassy angst here: “If this is the life, then who’d argue?” they ask on ‘This Is The Life’, and really, who would? Elsewhere, ‘Do You Want It All?’ does little more than repeat the same line over and over, but it’s irresistible, the gorgeous bridge being a particular highlight. It’s not complicated, then, but it is loads of fun; put simply, most of these songs are so instantly catchy and addictive you’ll be singing along by the second listen.

Having built momentum with a series of acclaimed singles last year, this debut should prove a success story. Of course, the patronage of boutique French label Kitsuné won’t exactly hurt the band either. Ten tracks long and clocking in at 32 minutes, Tourist History is a compact, hugely enjoyable record, low on filler and high on hooks. Indie dancefloors will surely throb to the best moments here throughout 2010. If there is a complaint to level at TDCC it’s that they are a touch generic at times, perhaps not differentiated enough from their peer group to really stand out. But that’s a minor quibble: these may be fleeting, one-dimensional pleasures, but pleasures they undoubtedly are.