Candy Riot may well have formed in the 2020s and become a mainstay of the Texas club scene since 2022, but the band’s collective heart and head appears to be living somewhere in the wilds of 1984. Their ‘Nico Loretto’ album from 2024 is absolutely loaded with superb retro pop, and its best songs blend the new wave aesthetic of the skinny tie brigade from the early years of US MTV with synth sounds pulled straight off early Depeche Mode albums, Ultravox’s ‘Vienna’ and Soft Cell’s brilliant – and eternally grubby – ‘Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret’. A combination of really bright sounding arrangements and great, harmonious pop vocals result in the kind of listen that feels nostalgic, even when the material is unfamiliar.

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