Electric President

Electric President is the second of Ben Cooper's projects, this time with Alex Kane. The sound is a mix with folk, pop, electronic, with a sound that would be very much like if you threw The Postal Service, The Decemberists, The Flaming Lips, and George Orwell in a large blender.

The songs are characterized by nasalized voices, acoustic riffs, MD-four tracks, SM58, and some computers.

Once upon a time it was the jukebox that made pop music. Or vice versa. Indeed, the vinyl-seven inch is romantic, a sentimental medium. And if one of those two Electric-President-singles were put in a jukebox the girls (and the boys) would dance. The buttons would soon be wellworn. Is it because the songs are romantic? Partly. It’s because the songs touch the very foundations of pop music: the storm and stress, the inwardness and the nonchalance, and melodies, melodies, melodies.

The universe of 24-year-old Ben Cooper from Jacksonville Beach/Florida is an echo-chamber with all kinds of doors that are open to small indie within big pop. All that can also be listened to on the self-titled debut (mm 062) that was published recently.

You have the right to remain awesome, vol. 1 begins with the organic “good ol’ boys”, a carefully arranged juxtaposition of soundtracks and sound signals. A track that borrows its concentration on rhythm and its electronic oscillations from digital music. A track that matures to analogue vividness – at the latest with Ben Cooper’s repetitive singing.

“Dotted lines” seems to be the exact opposite: almost a folksong, carried by an acoustic guitar and a likeable melody. Garnished with all interlocking and indulging that is so characteristic for Cooper’s arrangements. A soft but never sugary opulence.