ABSTRACT
Perhaps the most exuberantly intriguing and irresistible sounds (intentionally plural) to emerge from our son’s ever expanding music collection at age 14 were those generated by The Go! Team’s Thunder, Lightning, Strike (Memphis Industries 2004/Columbia 2005).1 When I initially overheard the record, I assumed it was a soundtrack. The songs were predominantly instrumental. They were upbeat, offbeat, occasionally cheesy, but in a familiar and funky sort of way. .HHQO\DZDUHRI WKHFOHDUO\GH¿QHGKLSSRVWXULQJSDUDPHWHUVDQGSDUHQWFKLOG bonding boundaries of advancing adolescence, I approached our son about the record with delicate curiosity. Without too much suspicion of a parent trap or setup, he responded like a newly enlisted Fan Clubber who had completed his music homework beyond his headsets, but at the same time remained true to tweendom with an interrogation succinct four-fragment response: “new group; lot of Internet buzz; from the UK; The Go! Team.”
