Babe Kiss And Tell

The band, made up of singer-leader Gerard Black (Findo Gask), guitarist Thomas Ogden, bassist Amaury Ranger (Francois and the Atlas Mountains) and new drummer/producer John Baillie Jnr (Bossy Love) have regrouped and refocused to deliver a record as much for the quiet hours as it is for the house party.
Kiss & Tell is an album which finds BABE striding confidently, if not swaggering, towards the dancefloor. You can hear disco music, house and techno, dream-pop and so much more on album number two, but it remains utterly cohesive. No longer uncategorized, Kiss & Tell is the only sad-disco album you’ll need in 2017.
“I used to be obsessed with Italo disco and all sorts of electronic dance music,” says Black, the owner of a heartbreaking falsetto which mellows the kick and thump of synth beats, and the sparkling array of Cocteau Twins-esque guitars on the album. “We definitely wanted this one to be a bit more upbeat and a bit of a party.”
Part of the party atmosphere was brought by new addition John Bailie Jnr, powerhouse drummer for Bossy Love and a much-admired dance producer. He came on board after Black had made a few passes at the record, and helped capture the electric atmosphere of BABE’s incredible live show. Black explains that “we sent one of the songs to John for a remix and he sent it back….and we thought ‘we just have to use this as the song!’. After that, we spent three days at John’s mum’s house in Shettleston, Glasgow, working on all the songs.”
It’s not all about the party, though, on Kiss & Tell. Black’s singing voice, a gorgeous high register which is at once both fragile and soothing, adds another dimension to BABE’s music. There’s often a sadness, a slight air of pleading desperation to the best disco and electronic music vocals, and Black is painfully aware of this: “I suppose my favourite lyrics are always the really sad ones. Arthur Russell was the king of doing that; making you dance but also giving you a dagger to the heart.”