“French Horn is hard to play. Making hot beats is fun and easy. LETS (sic) MAKE A BAND.”
— Robert Perlick-Molinari, 2007
French Horn Rebellion is a pair of Wisconsin-bred brothers living in Brooklyn and making dopey retro ‘80s-style synthpop. That one sentence pretty much covers it, but let’s go a bit deeper. David Perlick-Molinari once produced MGMT’s debut EP, Time to Pretend (but tellingly hasn’t worked with them since), and owns a recording studio. Robert Perlick-Molinari was once a promising French horn player who decided to give up his pursuit of the very difficult-to-break-into field of being a professional orchestra musician for the musically easier (but just as challenging success-wise) field of pop music. He does break out his horn on multiple occasions on Classically Trained, however, and these tend to be the bright spots on the album.
It’s hard to deny the catchiness of the beats on Classically Trained. Opener “The Right Time” features pulsing synths, piano breaks, organ chords, popping funk bass, layered harmonies, and a four-on-the-floor beat accented by a simple but effective fill. And the chirpy, high-pitched synth figure that shows up a couple of times is simultaneously annoying and an earworm. Second song “Classical Baby” has a big ‘80s pop chorus that’s effective, but the rest of the track quickly gets repetitive; it sounds like a lost minor hit from 1983 that was never all that good in the first place.
That’s kind of how it goes throughout the album. I go back to that opening quote and the fact that this is French Horn Rebellion’s third record. There’s a baseline competence at work here; the Perlick-Molinaris definitely know their way around the genre they’ve chosen to ape. The beats are solid and always danceable, but I often feel like they aren’t trying very hard at the actual songwriting. Instead of working harder to come up with a truly great chorus, the brothers usually stop at “pretty good”. Or they swipe a key change or beat drop from some actual ‘80s synthpop song and hope that the vague tickle of recognition will be an adequate substitute for a fresh idea.
When French Horn Rebellion does put more effort into the songwriting, the results speak for themselves. “Oh Sarah!” drops the synths in favor of spare, melodic piano riffs and a much more passionate vocal performance and even throws in a French horn outro, and it’s a noticeably better song because of it. “The Movement” has higher ambitions than recreating the ‘80s, which gives the song much more sonic variety than the rest of the album. The song ebbs and flows and crests with a melodic figure that’s repeated in a choir of voices, on synths, and on the French horn. It even throws in an actual snare drum sound at times instead of sticking solely to electronic drums. Similarly, closer “This is Our Heart” goes for a low-key but cheesy love song vibe and nails it. The vocal melody is strong, and Robert’s French horn is employed in layers throughout the song as a beautiful, mellow accompaniment.
In a couple of notable instances the duo comes tantalizingly close to making a good song but falls just short. “Classically Trained” falls into many of the same musical traps as the bulk of the album (at times sounding like an unfortunate art school take on LMFAO’s “Sexy and I Know It”), but the lyrics extolling the virtues of a fine arts education feel honest and that goes a long way. Also, the silly, classical-style synth solo is really fun. “Marching Punks” almost succeeds out of genuine affection for high school musicians and by being the most out-there track on the album. Unfortunately, it’s also super-repetitive. Hearing the Perlick-Molinaris chant variations on “All the kids in the marching band / All the kids in the orchestra / All the kids in the jazz band,” isn’t enough of a hook to make the song work — especially not over minimalist EDM beats. I did like the electronic drum break in the middle of the song that resembles a marching band drumline feature, though.
Classically Trained ends up having too much dopey and not compelling enough to make it worth a recommendation. The flashes of songwriting creativity are just sufficient to make me think French Horn Rebellion has a full album of good songs in them, but this is not that album. More focus on songwriting and less slavish devotion to ‘80s synth trappings can only benefit the Perlick-Molinaris in the future.