Preview: Los Campesinos!, Wednesday, February 15, at Club Dada

This Welsh septet arrived four years ago on the coattails of similarly energetic U.K. bands (Bloc Party, The Go! Team), blending clamor with sweetness. "You! Me! Dancing!," off their 2008 debut, Hold On Now, Youngster, boasts such bracing pop attack, Budweiser used it in a commercial last year. The writing...

By Chris Parker

February 9, 2012

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This Welsh septet arrived four years ago on the coattails of similarly energetic U.K. bands (Bloc Party, The Go! Team), blending clamor with sweetness. "You! Me! Dancing!," off their 2008 debut, Hold On Now, Youngster, boasts such bracing pop attack, Budweiser used it in a commercial last year. The writing is sharp, as on "Straight In At 101," off 2010's Romance Is Boring, and each successive album's downplayed the rock end of their sound. The departure of singer Aleks prior to their latest, Hello Sadness, eliminated boy/girl harmonies, heaping duties on Gareth Paisey's adenoidal tenor. Portland's Parenthetical Girls open.

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