The Ditty Bops

(Warner Bros.)
by Tim Den

This was a total surprise. Expecting Fiona Apple-ish, semi-mainstream “girl group slick pop,” I was elated to be welcomed by The Ditty Bops‘ spin on ragtime/jazz swing/cabaret for the 21st century. Wiggling the adorable tails on their nectar sweet vocal harmonies to the stylings of The Beatles’ “Honey Pie,” visions of Flappers, gangsters, Tommy Guns, and Prohibition flash through your mind as the girls sing about everything from death (“Momma buried Pop atop the roof where he slept”), existentialism in modern society (“Gentle Sheep”), to sexual ambiguity (“There’s a girl that you might know/she’s a friend at least I tell you so/but it might surprise you to find/there’s something going on behind the door”). With a wink here and a nudge there – not to mention the occasional celebration of dried blood and crusted mucus – The Ditty Bops sashay past the proverbial graveyard of nostalgia acts and into the arena of the classy and Now. They might shimmy like the glorious ’20s, but their wit and sophistication are a perfect match for the present day.
(www.thedittybops.com)