With the release of “Step Into The Mood,”Los Angeles-based electro pop trio Iconique quickly exploded across the blogosphere and elsewhere as the single was praised by Gawker and Surviving the Golden Age, was featured on Hype Machine and received radio airplay on KUCI and KCHUNG, thanks to a sound that’s been described by some of my colleagues as a “synthesis of influences like Prince, David Bowie and Chic.” Interestingly, their last single “Sitting Pretty” sonically seemed to draw equally from Roxy Music, The Human League, Howard Jones and others as Leo Paparella’s speak-song and crooning are paired with a sinuous bass line, shimmering synths and propulsive drumming to craft a song that sounded as though it could have easily been released sometime between 1981 and 1983.
Interestingly, as Paparella explained in press notes, “‘Sitting Pretty’ is both a celebration and critique of vanity. There’s very much an innate cruelty to glamor. It operates out of exclusivity, which keeps its scope woefully narrow and out of touch. And I bet that’s why people want it so badly.” And as a result, the song possess a subtle yet palpable sense of menace and anxiousness under the clean, hyper-modern and danceable sheen. Recently Mitch Murder released an elegantly shimmering, preening and moodier remix that Leo Paparaella describes as a “fantastically power bitch. It makes me want to watch Dynasty, wear Escada, and douse myself in Giorgio Beverly Hills. He captured the tongue-in-cheek haughtiness of the original. Sonically, he moved the song from 1981 to 1987, so she’s older, colder and wiser now. She traded her silicone for saline.”