[MP3] Thief’s ‘Broken Boy’

Just gotta’ drop a little copy and pasted press release here, it;s not often we get press releases with lists of awards in. “Thief is the new electronic pop project of PJ Wolf. A previous winner of the Triple J Unearthed Top Song competition and recipient of the Foundation for Young Australians Buzz Grant, PJ was recently shortlisted for the prestigious Vanda and Young songwriting competition for his track Closer.” We can’t help but wonder of the Foundation for Young Australians Buzz Grant is a grant for young Australians who buzz or a buzzing grant for young Australians, we’d like to think it was the latter, must be a nightmare in batteries. Whatever the case, that’s quite an impressive rack of achievements this guy had to his name, and now he’s traded in his guitars for some altogether better synthesizers and joined forced with Brisbane-based producer Matt Redlich (Emma Louise, Hungary Kids Of Hungary, Yes You) to form Thief to deliver the sweetest of SynthPop tunes, like Broken Boy.

Broken Boy is like a soulful Kraftwerk. Vintage drum machine beats with an old school Electro pop craft out B-boy rhythms amidst a sea of analog arpeggios that forms a nice contrast to the more Indie piano and bass work. Quite a stripped down and minimal track, Broken Boy still maintains it’s humanity, largely thanks to the heartfelt vocals that wash the track. The tune is complimented by a reMix from Brazilian producer Césare, who turns the track into a lush dance tune. Not quite Nu-Disco, but leveraging a lot of funk in it’s retro dancefloor action. An impressive début all-round, we’ll be keeping an eye on Thief.