by RAF KATIGBAK

Plugs Plus, the latest album by the trio Dat Politics from Lille, France, teeters precariously on the border of the experimental and pop, subverting the chin-stroking academia of glitch and noise music by injecting it with quirky, catchy-as-fuck melodies, playful sound collage and smatterings of real, live vocals. Their hi-fi/lo-fi 8-bit-Nintendo-on-crank sound isn't so much faux-hawked nostalgia for the '80s as a modern mutation of video-game music. Ready to take their high-energy laptop performance on a month-long North American tour, Dat Politician Claude took a few moments to give the Mirror the lowdown.

Mirror: How do you feel about your music being described as juvenile and immature?

Claude: I like this idea, to be seen as juvenile. Who wouldn't? At the same time, it's also frustrating. We sometimes have the feeling that people don't take us seriously. It's not because you're having fun in doing music that you're not doing it with application! It's also some work to build an entertaining track! For some journalists, it's considered as minor, especially if you don't want to conceptualize your music.

M: Are you worried about the anti-French sentiments that have been popping up throughout the States since the war in Iraq?

C: I hope that we won't get any trouble with people who will be there to hear us. On the road maybe, if we meet some psycho rednecks, we'll pretend to be from Switzerland.

M: Make sure to pick up some freedom fries while you're down there. I hear they're wacktastic!

C: The freedom fries story shows how people can be so stupid and extreme in this kind of situation, especially in the USA. Actually, French fries are from Belgium and the north of France, where we're staying at the moment - it's also the best place to eat some good ones. At first it was not potatoes, it was some little fishes, but one day, the sea was frozen so they put the potatoes in the oil!

With Nanobot Auxiliary Ballet
at la Sala Rossa on Thursday, May 15, 9pm, $10

>> Music Listings