The Franco-American duo hasn’t mellowed and continues their madcap odyssey on their second album.
There are times when a band eases off the gas on a sophomore record, putting aside youthful flamboyance to prove their seriousness and maturity. We feared Faux Real might take this route since Faux Ever (2024), depriving us of their whimsical electro-pop tracks, carried by choruses wonderfully absurd and meticulously synchronized. A great relief was felt when watching the clip for That Far, a teaser single released in May: brothers Elliott and Virgile Arndt still treat us to dance moves reminiscent of a boy band, dressed in coordinated outfits. Don’t be fooled by those grave expressions, which perfectly cloak the pleasure the duo took in writing and recording the eleven new songs on Poison Time, written and laid down in just four months at their home in Los Angeles (after years living between that city, Paris, and London).
Still perched between experimental pastiche and genuine commitment (hence the band name they chose six years ago), between contemporary art performance and authentic DIY know-how, these self-taught artists push further here by fully embracing their eccentricity and their vision of an arty electro-pop, crafted with a thousand special effects. On Circuit Breaker, jagged guitars sit beside frenzied beats and unsettling synths, blending euphoria with unease. References to the eighties appear on Seesaw, to the nineties on One & Done, and to hyperpop on several tracks (including the autotuned V o i d).
Conquering Every Horizon
Faux Real might be perplexing at first, but they manage to unite their varied influences with an irresistible sense of melody — consider the single I Got Mine, which sounds as if it were written by Portugal.The Man in this blend of acoustic guitar and synth-pop. It’s a fearless, boundary-free approach that isn’t new, and it sets out to conquer every horizon, as their collaborations with Metronomy and Miki in 2024, Wet Leg in 2025, and their remix for Étienne Daho in the same year demonstrate. While they gear up to reach even greater distances on a worldwide tour this fall, the Arndt brothers show with this new album that their love for music was never a whim but a true vocation.
Poison Time (b4). Out September 4. Live on November 17 at Bus Palladium, Paris.
