Dum Dum Girls

I'm listening to and enjoying the Dum Dum Girls' album Only in Dreams, which came out last year.  These are really catchy pop songs.  It's interesting to me that singer/song-writer/main creative force Dee Dee doesn't list The Pretenders as an influence.  She sounds like a carbon-copy of Chrissie Hynde fronting The Smiths.

If I have any criticism of this album, it's that the arrangements are a bit too simple.  I've written before about how bands should simplify overwrought album production, but these songs go a bit too far in the other direction.  They seem to function on the presumption that if everything is reversed out, than you don't have to play anything that's actually interesting.  Sadly, I think many of these songs could benefit from interesting bass lines.

But the songs are so good, so catchy, and sung with such emotion and power that I don't really care all that much, in the end.  It's a really good summer album.  Provided you like Chrissie Hynde.