Getdown Services - Massive Champion

‘Massive Champion’ is really, really annoyingly charming. Getdown Services make music that frequently inspires the thought “please stop doing that”, only to lodge the offending bit in your brain for the next six hours. Bastards.

It starts with someone dramatically and spectacularly throwing up on a bus. No thank you. Lose that and we’re flying. ‘I Can’t Die Like That’ is enormously boppy, even if it feels like it should be going about 20% faster, while ‘Probiotic’ commits so thoroughly to its joke that you’ve got it within 30 seconds and there are still several minutes left. This should be irritating. Often, it is. And yet.

The secret is the detail - Josh Law and Ben Sadler find comedy in the hyper-specific debris of everyday British life, pushing it far enough that the familiar becomes surreal. ‘Cha Cha Slide’ is nostalgic and unexpectedly adorable; ‘The Radiator’ is pure good-time silliness. Soon the whole record starts resembling the soundtrack to a comedy show that doesn’t exist, somewhere between gig, sketch and Flight of the Conchords-style musical absurdity.

And my god, the earworms. They’re everywhere.

In considerably less funny times, there’s real value in a record this committed to having a party. ‘Massive Champion’ is bonkers, irritating, weird and relentlessly likeable. Fine. You win. Just, please, stop talking about sick.