(photo: Rob Fournier)

Toronto’s Modernboys Moderngirls are a curious affair.  Their Myspace bio hypothesizes that they are either punk rockers who play soul music or soul musicians who play punk rock; I get that after listening to their debut, I Might As Well Break It.

You remember when Marty “Michael J. Fox” McFly picks up an axe and joins the band on stage at the Enchantment Under The Sea dance?  He kicks off “Johnny B. Good” and the audience is firmly with him until he really starts rocking out and they’re left scratching their heads, more than a little worried about possible demonic possession.  Modernboys Moderngirls may not appear to have sold their souls, but I could picture the same kind of familiarity/confusion if they were ever to play their songs to an audience raised at the height of classic Motown soul.

I could imagine an all-girl band in sequin dresses on grainy black-and-white television singing “My Baby Says, Boy Don’t You Ever Go” accompanied by a wall-of-soundalike arrangement played by musicians positioned firmly off camera.  As their (pretentious anyone?) name implies, these boys are of the here and now. “I Can Hardly Stand” subtracts the detached cool of The Strokes and just leaves behind the spare, garagey rock sound.  In lesser hands, an album’s worth of classic rock-pop blueprint tampering songs would grow tedious and monotonous, but Modernboys Moderngirls have managed to keep the listener on their toes by mixing up the tempo (the slow burner “In Another Year” is a surprising highlight) and delicately balancing on the serious-cheeky borderline.

Soul-punk, punk-soul, whatever: Modernboys Moderngirls are back to the future and they have a story in song to tell you.  I Might As Well Break It is available in stores and online today.

MP3: Modernboys Moderngirls “My Baby Says Boy, Don’t You Ever Go”
Myspace: Modernboys Moderngirls
Facebook: Modernboys Moderngirls