The Pleasure of the Unpretentious

Pony Pony Run Run are a French electro-pop duo from Lille, and they make music that doesn’t pretend to be anything other than exactly what it is: bright, propulsive, slightly giddy. Their 2009 debut, You Need Pony Pony Run Run, sounded like someone had discovered that synthesizers and forward motion were essentially the same thing. There’s a track called "Champion" that I physically cannot listen to while seated. I’ve tried. The vocals are in English despite the band being thoroughly French, which used to seem like a decision and now just seems like the only logical call—the music doesn’t really have a nationality, it just has momentum. I don’t need music to be complicated to mean something to me. Sometimes I need it to be exactly this: clean, fast, and a little ridiculous. Very few bands do that better.