English rocker Miles Kane, popular solo artist and former frontman of The Rascals, is perhaps best known in recent years for his work with Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner as co-lead of their project the Last Shadow Puppets. For nearly a decade the two close friends have used the Shadow Puppets as an outlet to produce music akin to the kind they were inspired by, creating a homage-laden kind of modern rock with clear influence from past U.K. trends ranging from glam rock through to britpop. Last Shadow Puppets aside, those same influences color Kane’s solo work as well, as clearly evidenced on his latest solo effort “Electric Flower.” Released ahead of Kane’s upcoming October LP Sunlight in the Shadows, “Electric Flower” is positively dripping with old-school glam rock panache, delivered in a way that sounds familiar beyond simple nostalgia.
To state the obvious, “Electric Flower” sounds exactly like a vintage ’70s glam rock track, plucked directly from the mid-century airwaves. More specifically, it sounds exactly like T. Rex (or Bowie, if you like, but Bowie at that point was also trying to sound like T. Rex) – and that’s quite the point. Kane knows this just as surely his audience, and the homage here is worn directly on his sleeve. That said, “Electric Flower” owes perhaps just as much, at least in its production ethos, to a whole subgenre of contemporary rock music that’s arisen dedicated to siphoning that particular sort of sound through the ages and directly into modern earlobes. The oeuvre of bands like The Black Keys, or even some of fellow Last Shadow Puppet Alex Turner’s work with Arctic Monkeys, immediately crop to mind in that regard. “Electric Flower” slots neatly into that same fold, complete with all the idiomatic hallmarks of both sonic progenitor and progeny. Fuzzed-out guitar licks drip over a strutting, lascivious beat while Kane channels Marc Bolan’s sultry croon in an ode on a botanically-dubbed lover, all wrapped up in a warm layer of saturation that recalls both retro recordings, and the scores of present-day tracks made to invoke that same analog aura.
The music video accompanying “Electric Flower” embraces the song’s classic aesthetic and reliance on tried-and-true rock hallmarks. Kane parades center-stage amongst a loosely choregraphed cast dressed with varying degrees of ostentation, and probably sets a record for starring in the umpteenth rock video set largely in a graffitied overpass. To be clear, that’s not a criticism – just like the track itself , the video for “Electric Flower” is perfectly self-aware of its callbacks to music video cliché in a way somewhere between being played perfectly straight and with tongue-in-cheek. Spot the more loosely dressed members of Kane’s posse for proof, as well as the occasional clear break in his swaggering façade. All the flourish and bravado is clearly revealed to be an affectation, and knowing that brings a humor to the affair that only adds to the song’s inherent upbeat vigor.