Rinôçérôse

It’s a shame that there’s already a compilation called French Fried Funk, because that’s exactly what this fusion of live percussion, guitar-centric funk and extremely danceable rhythms reminds me of. Gallic, Gauloise-in-hand trio Rinocerose, who named themselves after a painting by a mental patient who couldn’t spell, are shakin’ lots of French booty and bringing live guitar back onto the house music dance floor. Embellished by gorgeous funky flute, these bouncy, dubbed-out house grooves have reached people all over Europe and are being played (an awful lot) by impressive DJs like Pete Heller, Joe Claussell and Andrew Weatherall. This mini-album (though it has ten songs) is filled with extremely interesting music with vaguely pretentious, humorous and appropriate titles like “323 secondes de musique repetitive avec guitare espagnole” and “I love my guitare” — yet it has no comparison in the electro-music world, and can definitely be called both ground-breaking and is extremely pleasing to the ear. Jean-Philippe Freu, his wife Patou and programmer Johnny Columbo have indeed created one of this year’s most innovative house records. Described as “Underworld meets Air,” I must say I prefer them to either.