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Epitaph Records -- Millencolin

Louis XIV, par la grâce de Dieu roi de France et de Navarre...

There's something remarkably pompous about naming a band after the Sun King, as his name conveys a sense of splendor and decadence that one assumes would seem rather soulless and vapid in a band. San Diego's Louis XIV is anything but, and their new EP Illegal Tender sets a high bar for their impending full length.

With gigs supporting the Killers under their belt and an impending tour with Hot Hot Heat it's easy to jump to the conclusion that Louis XIV falls into the same batch of new wave revivalists. However that's not accurate at all as Louis XIV draw from a far deeper-rooted set of influences, everything from Voidoids-style NYC punk to British guitar pop (with a bit of glam swagger for good measure). Jason Hill still shows shades of his past fronting Convoy, but the Stones / Beach Boys influences that band so readily flaunted are far less apparent here. This EP is in fact Louis XIV's third and follows up a self-released full-length, but it's their first under a new arrangement with Atlantic. With the major label push and their already hipster-friendly tour partners, prepare for an onslaught of hype in the coming months.

So before NME throws its sensationalist press machine into overdrive and you settle into that inevitable pit of resulting apathy, there's plenty to get excited about with Illegal Tender. The song "Louis XIV" stomps and swaggers with an oversexual Stooges / Velvet Underground feel. Hill's obviously having too much fun to keep up his Lou Reed monotone up for long, and the band's songwriting quickly departs from expected garage-rock territory with the single "Finding Out True Love Is Blind." The song makes every effort to come off as offensive and overconfident, only to be curiously broken up by Lindsey Troy's guest vocals. It has the effect of turning what's otherwise a dumb song about sex into something a bit more clever and self-aware. The title track is wonderfully bizarre. It's a march done entirely in quirky spoken vocals that calls to mind the familiar "There is a man..." rhyme from Citizen Kane (which also appeared verbatim in the White Stripes song "The Union Forever"). Even more striking is the rhythm of the song, which is eerily similar to the classic novelty "They're Coming To Take Me Away (ha ha)" by (and this is too perfect to be anything but deliberate) the late 60's band Napoleon XIV. The following "Marc" is a complete a 180-degree turn: a sensitive piano ballad that falls somewhere on the family tree between Ziggy Stardust and 90's Britpop. The instrumental "Louis Reprise" wraps up the EP with a curious and playful mix of horns, violins and handclaps. It's an odd ending that completely breaks any genre mold the previous songs may have created and leaves one with the distinct impression that Louis XIV has no intentions of getting too comfortable with one style.

Jason Hill told PopMatters that after being burned by the end results of the last Convoy full-length he "can't imagine handing off our songs to anyone else now." This reportedly resulted in an Atlantic deal that guarantees the band the power to self-produce their coming material. If that's true, then there's plenty of hope that their upcoming full-length (and beyond) will be something to pay attention to. The last thing Louis XIV needs at this point is someone to rein in their eccentricities.



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    Posted by Anonymous on Monday, February 14, 2005 at 7:56 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    i love them soooo much
    brian is my boo..lol

    Posted by Anonymous on Monday, February 7, 2005 at 11:06 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    Louis the fourteenth is lame ass radio bullshit music. They blow meatsticks along with their best friends franz ferdinand and the killers.

    Posted by lushj on 2005-02-05 18:36:42
    My Score:

    Bummer, I thought this was a "lifestyle band" like the Upper Crust. Then we could have a "Battle Royale with Cheese" tour with The Upper Crust versus Louis XIV. Finally, the French versus English animosity could be settled where it oughta be- on a rocknroll stage! The Yuppie Pricks could open, to get the juices of elitist rock flowing...

    Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, February 3, 2005 at 6:17 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    Indie 103.1 has been playing these guys for almost 6 months actually. KROQ jumped on the bandwagon about a month ago.

    I saw these guys back in may or june open up for the Backyard Babies. Fun band

    Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, February 3, 2005 at 3:50 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    BSD is such a fucking fag.

    Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, February 3, 2005 at 12:04 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    I miss Convoy,but Louis xiv flat out rocks!!

    Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, February 2, 2005 at 10:41 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    I'm sick of "stomping sexuality". Maybe I'm too exposed. I don't know.

    Nothing makes me more apathetic about a band than more sexual double entendres and "rampant sexuality".

    -BSD

    Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, February 2, 2005 at 5:47 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    one of those chick's boobs is saggy

    Posted by swingline on 2005-02-02 12:15:02
    My Score:

    where do i need to be to receive indie 103.1 without a shit load of static?

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 9:52 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    indie 103.1 plays finding out true love is blind every single day when i'm driving home from work. for about the past month and a half, maybe more. i actually still don't really mind the song, which is surprising.

    Posted by Anchors on 2005-02-01 21:47:34
    My Score:

    Speaking of Louis XIV, anybody know when the Spirit Of Versailles reunion show is going down?

    Posted by tristan on 2005-02-01 20:57:14
    My Score:

    If you’re not rocking to “Finding Out True Love Is Blind” by the time you read this, it’s probably because your idea of the club scene is the Hair Club for Men.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 8:41 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    Rolling Stone is an embaresment(sic?) to music. I do like when they do articles on John Stewart though, cuz he rules. They write good articles every now and then, they just know nothing about music. I like how they lumped The Blood Brothers in with "emo". Rolling Stone can go fuck itself.

    -!GreenVandal!

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 8:06 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    "Beloved of US hipsters who like to make-believe that they are British"

    maybe its the fact that, with the exception of the stooges and ramones and very few others, most major american rock n roll music fucking blows.

    Posted by shindo on 2005-02-01 17:37:31
    My Score:

    See I actually sort of like NME, at least their website, which I check daily. On one hand they're horribly sensationalistic (everything's a SHOCKER! or BREAKING NEWS! or EXCLUSIVE!) and talk some bands to death (Razorlight, Libertines), but I'm sort of charmed that they're still excited about rock music. You read Rolling Stone nowadays and it's all about vapid pop stars, fashion, or odd expose stories that have nothing to do with music.

    -adam

    Posted by ThriveToFailure on 2005-02-01 15:53:31
    My Score:

    NME: UK based weekly music paper. Beloved of US hipsters who like to make-believe that they are British and, because of the current exchange rate, pay far more for their copies than we do.

    Posted by theevilmonkey on 2005-02-01 13:57:14
    My Score:

    Score is for the boobs. One star for each,. like Janet Jackson,

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 1:09 PM (EST)
    My Score:

    I dont pay much attention to the press...what the hell is NME? I hear everyone damning them constantly.

    -!Greenvandal!

    Posted by CallingLondon on 2005-02-01 12:12:43
    My Score:

    i'm definitely interested but i'm not buying a new cd based soley on a review, as good as it is. gimme mp3s. i need someone to restore my slowly dying faith in rock n' roll.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 8:38 AM (EST)
    My Score:

    This score is for the early in the day posting of new reviews.

    It also represents Anntti Autti's gold-medal superpipe run last night... though I'd take Danny Kass' Ipod playlist first any day.

    OC

    Posted by sickboi on 2005-02-01 08:35:53
    My Score:

    Fuck "new" New Wave.

    Posted by ThriveToFailure on 2005-02-01 05:12:25
    My Score:

    Score is for the NME... and censoring the cover.

    Posted by Potatoeboy56 on 2005-02-01 02:49:16
    My Score:

    Score is for the single "finding out true love is blind." Although good, it still doesnt make up for the fact we lost an awesome band in Convoy.

    Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 12:25 AM (EST)
    My Score:

    My interest is piqued... any mp3's?

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