ARTIST: Phoenix               

TITLE:  United

YEAR RELEASED: 2000

CHART ACTION: None

SINGLES: Party Time, Too Young (#148 UK), If I Ever Feel Better (#65 UK).

OTHER SONGS YOU MAY KNOW: Whoa, no.

LINEUP: Laurent Brancowitz, Christian Mazzalai, Deck d’Arcy, Thomas Mars, Jr. Session players help out, especially on drums and percussion.

WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT: French alt rock band releases a pretty confident and tuneful debut that not a lot of people heard outside of Western Europe.

SOME WORDS, PHRASES AND CLAUSES ABOUT THIS RECORD: Phoenix became an ‘overnight’ sensation about nine years after their debut, which did a pretty good job of establishing themselves and their sound.

A pleasant pop-friendly mix with keyboards and guitars (and some nice guitar flourishes that tend to get hidden on the radio), Phoenix did place “Too Young” on a couple of movie soundtracks, which helped their exposure a little bit.

The album breezes by except for a the three part “Funky Squaredance”. They tried to do too much there, and it doesn’t work for the most part. Fortunately it’s the second to last cut.

NOTES & MINUTIAE: Thomas Mars (nee Thomas Croquet) is married to Sofia Coppola.

IS THERE A DELUXE VERSION: A remix of “Too Young” is on a newer release.

GRADE: B+: Nicely put together, except for a couple of stumbling blocks that end the momentum.