** Arling & Cameron

ALL-IN

(Emperor Norton)

The Dutch duo of Gerry Arling and Richard Cameron probably meant to express their musical inclusiveness when they titled their first stateside release All-In, but I've got a better suggestion: Sensory Overload. The talented electronic composers flit around the stylistic map, zooming in on Japanese kitsch pop, alluding to Gershwin melodies and mod '60s soundtracks, and taking detours into revved-up French disco. This multi-culti mishmash makes listening akin to following a bouncing ball in zero gravity -- it's a mind-boggling swirl of zany synthesizers and gleeful gibberish.

But run through a strainer, Arling & Cameron's ideas come through quite nicely, even when the duo are being fey. "Voulez-vous?" takes a familiar French phrase and recasts it into an irresistible space-funk package. "We Love Dancing" is a giggle fest disguised as a song, complete with skittering electronic beats and peppered with a girls' chorus that repeats the title ad nauseam. In other words, there actually is a thread hidden in this Technicolor haystack, an irrepressible postmodern optimism that updates the sentiment of "Good Day Sunshine" and "Feelin' Groovy" for today's generation.

-- Richard Martin