For so many years a cult concern, Hot Chip these days are public property. Everyone’s heard of Hot Chip. Everyone’s got an opinion about Hot Chip, however ill-considered or half-baked. They’re a proper pop group, or at least as much of a proper pop group as it’s possible to be without slinging your ideals out the window.

As time has worn on and their stock risen, so Hot Chip’s confidence in themselves has grown. They seem to be happy with who they are, what Hot Chip is, and while their first two albums were quite exploratory and unpredictable affairs, by the time of 2008’s Made in The Dark you felt as though Alexis Taylor, Joe Goddard and pals had nailed their sound. Certainly their new LP, One Life Stand, is a reinforcement and refinement of that sound, rather than any kind of radical departure.

factmag.com