Barfly

"This urgent, weird record is bereft of the kind of reassuring reference points that tend to signify obvious commercial success, and is absolutely deserving of it for precisely that reason." Guardian Guide"The Chap give birth to freakish dadaist disco babies. You’ll love it." NME"It's cerebral and detached in its methodology but visceral in its impact. Most of all it's fantastic fun. Serious fun." The Wire The Chap consist of Berit Immig (keyboards, vocals), Johannes von Weizsäcker (guitar, vocals, computer, cello), Panos Ghikas (bass, violin, guitar, computer, vocals), Keith Duncan (drums, keyboards, vocals). They are a London-based modern pop group named after a magazine on how to be the perfect contemporary gentleman. They claim they “have never been influenced by anything or anyone, ever.” Now that’s not strictly true. They are influenced by many things, such us the entire pop canon, the entire world cinema canon, food, drink, free improv and liberal Trotskyism. The resulting sound is a unique brand of pop music containing many a snippet of noise as well as space-rock choirs, exploding string instruments and lyrics about courage, modesty, sex and asthma. The band itself started when Johannes persuaded Panos and Claire to play live gigs with him for his solo project. They were soon joined by Keith and developed into a full band, writing all the music together.  It wasn't long before they attracted the sharply tuned and eclectic ears of Lo Recordings (Cursor Miner, Red Snapper, et al) and this gave birth to a series of releases, culminating in their first two albums, The Horse(2003) and Ham(2005). Recorded and produced entirely by the band, both albums received enthusiastic reviews, posed challenges to music technology journalists and afforded the band the joys of extensively touring both the UK and Europe (including two sold out shows in Athens) and opening for the likes of ESG, Alan Vega, Why? and Tom Vek (himself a fan). Audience reactions have suggested it is possible to be overwhelmed by the unexpected and then to learn how to dance to it in the space of ten minutes. Recently, the Chap have been busy producing plenty of new material (in which they tackle classic economic theory with plenty of harmony singing) as well as remixing singles for their new fans Beck and Bloc Party (both Remixes were released Spring 2007). The new album is due early next year.  Come along! It’s worth it. Kids at gigs have said the Chap “really rock” and “are really out there” and “look like teachers”.