Singles

Operator Please - Get What You Want

Tim Miller 13/02/2008

Rating: 4.5/5

Sometimes I feel as though it is my mission in life - or at least a 2008 New Year's resolution - to champion this band to death. On more than one occasion around this site, I've talked up this group of Aussie teens whose music is a satisfyingly pure and straightforward arm of guitar pop, and it's a God-bestowed sign, surely, that their new single descends through my letter box to rave over.

Get What You Want kicks off with a bass figure that sounds as smooth and driving as the latest Aston Martin setting off for a blast through empty country roads. Sassy vocals from NME's next Beth Ditto-esque icon Amandah, also on duty with clangy Rickenbacker lead, saunter their Southern-hemispheric way to the forefront of the track, dripping with self-assured but bubbly attitude. As Get What You Want unfurls, the insistent hi-hat powers the five-piece along, Taylor's violin melodies weaving between and alongside vocal and drums, that bassline still underpinning all the elements which build to an explosive chorus, advising despairingly “You don't always get what you want” to the prospective Mr Smug. At least that seems what it's about.

It's deliberately catchy, with pop tendencies among every area of the song, but tied together with an atmosphere of fun, of unabashed excitement at making music for what it is. Guaranteed to make you want to dance, it's a simultaneously cute and lively song of irresistible charm, and all the more endearing when you see their cherry faces. Songs like this are the reason the single format is still relevant today.

Watch the video here.

Released 3rd March 2008