Xeno & Oaklander - Par Avion

Wendlebo’s French tinged (she’s French) breathy vocals are likeable, but with the analogue synths and cheap drumbeats continually set to the “Fade to Grey” mode, it does end up overpowering her light as a feather voice as the album goes on. There’s also a lack of variety with the beats that result in each track in its own right being fine, but when you have nine of them in a row, it creates an album desperate for some kind of diversity.

That said, Par Avion does contain tracks of merit. “Jasmine Nights” slows down the drum machine pounding, adds shoegazey vocal reverb and Movement-era New Order synths for a captivating coldwave highlight. The Blade Runner cum Front 242 approach on “Providence” is a welcome cinematic moment, and the harder edged “G. Bruno” - with lead vocals handled by McBride (a less strangulated Andy McCluskey from OMD) - introduces a refreshing jittery early eighties EBM sound to their canon.

But when they slow it down further, it results in tracks like the instrumental “Reflections”, a funereal dirge which acts as filler. There are also issues when they ramp the speed up, too; “Nuage d’Ivoire” sounds like it’s recorded at the wrong speed, sounding way too near to “Photographic”, a throwaway pop track by Depeche Mode who recorded this kind camp pop down the discotheque thing better - and thirty three years ago.

Par Avion is awash with slightly gothic electronic doom in thrall to Giorgio Moroder and proto-industrial types Crash Course in Science in equal measure, but by continuing to use such a clinical production ethic, they will always remain obtuse, pale executors of the slightly indie, slightly analogue thing, and slightly ethereal, esoteric electro thing.

There are artists who trade in the likes of this much better, acts such as Ladytron or Soft Metals, acts who can do retro electro pop without killing the warmth of sound by using such harsh digital production or over-reliance on reverb. Xenon & Oaklander are nearly there, but not quite.