It’s bad form in music journalism to compare an act to others, but rules are made to be broken. Confidence Man’s third album is a joyous journey into gen X-era club music: Saint Etienne, Deee-lite, Underworld, Happy Mondays … There’s no avoiding dropping references: 3AM (La La La) is practically a drinking game.
Front and centre of Confidence Man are hype-squad vocalists Grace Stephenson (AKA Janet Planet) and Aidan Moore (answers to Sugar Bones), beloved for their camp choreo and outrageous outfits. But what’s clearer than ever on 3AM (La La La) is that production team Sam Hales and Lewis Stephenson work up just as much sweat.
Even the artwork – The Matrix meets Bride of Frankenstein – hints at their monster mash of influences. The album title pays respect to 3AM Eternal, the 1991 acid house hit from equally maverick pop act the KLF. That duo regularly used unlicensed samples as their building blocks, whereas Confidence Man lay their foundations with finely honed production mimicry. But the two acts share the same kind of light-fingered playfulness.
ConMan’s last album, Tilt, headed straight from lockdown to the dancefloor as soon as it was let off the leash, but 3AM (La La La) has so much energy it makes Tilt look positively geriatric. When restrictions were eased, the Brisbane band ditched their share house in Melbourne (with its back yard club, named The Fuck Bunker) and took off to Dalston, east London, to be closer to the source. My own sketchy memory of 90s rave culture in that suburb is of warehouse squats populated by German shepherds and the odd BMW. The sound systems blasted an eye-glazing filthy-techno-squelch, so I’m happy to overwrite those dank memories with something much fresher; what Stephenson has dubbed “Bubblegum warehouse”.
Album opener Who Knows What You’ll Find encapsulates all the giddiness of the move to London. The riff of Depeche Mode’s Just Can’t Get Enough pulls on a flimsy disguise, but Stephenson’s sublime vocals, layered to infinity, lift this track into a different stratosphere. It’s chased by another insane banger – Glastonbury 2024 went wild for I Can’t Lose You, a track so contagious we could be in for another pandemic.
Sniffer dogs will be working overtime during Breakbeat, which Stephenson delivers with all the sass of Betty Boo of 1990’s Doin’ the Do fame. The production warps and stretches her words, Fatboy Slim’s Rockafeller Skank-style, with the song expanding into the most glorious highs.
Moore takes the vocal lead in Sicko, transporting us to Happy Mondays-era Hacienda, then melting into a moody outro that takes things down a notch. Still in Manchester, Wrong Idea surfs on the back of vintage New Order synth sounds. That’s OK – even New Order’s last album was a homage to its 1980s and 1990s incarnations.
Confidence Man preferred to work on this album in the small hours (3am was the sweet spot), with some of the lyrics written on the fly. Occasionally that’s obvious, but whatever. We’re not here for nuggets of wisdom. ConMan are inviting you to escape, pure and simple.
The album closes with the title track with its melancholic “la la la” and occasional lyrical nod to the KLF original. Just as Andy Weatherall remixed tracks from Tilt, the KLF’s Jimmy Cauty is behind a soon-to-be released remix of this track – surely the ultimate stamp of approval.
Whereas the KLF went for broke by burning a million quid of their profits and deleting their entire back catalogue (before relenting nearly 30 years later and re-releasing it), Confidence Man are in pursuit of ever-bigger budgets with which to world-build. As Stephenson told the Guardian in 2022: “I don’t see why indie musicians can’t sell out … All we need now is the opportunity.” With this album, they’ve guaranteed they’ll get it.
3AM (La La La) is out now (I Oh You)
