Hometown: London.
The lineup: Susanne Aztoria (vocals), Jimmy Lee (guitar), Dayo James (drums).
The background: Edwyn Collins of Orange Juice must have been feeling particularly inspired on that bright spring afternoon (it might have been a dull winter morning but we're being poetic) back in the early 80s when he decided on a name for the band he had just formed with his two young Scottish female friends: Strawberry Switchblade. Because by calling them that, he didn't just alight upon an evocative moniker with its intimations of deliciousness and danger, he inadvertently came up with something really important: he made sense of and gave formal shape to a sound that had been there or thereabouts (particularly via the Velvets, the Banshees and the Cocteau Twins) for many years and turned it into a new rock aesthetic. Basically, that whole tranche of bands, from My Bloody Valentine to the 80s and 90s shoegazers to today's Brooklyn cutie revivalists, were born on that fateful day, as was the notion of fusing polar opposites: pop and rock, the incendiary and the sugary, the sweet and the savage. Nice one, Edwyn.
Trailer Trash Tracys aren't the first band to try and squeeze together the innocent sound of girl-group pop and the reverb and drones of something more challenging, even nasty. A contrast between darkness and light, dissonance and melody, the vicious and the sublime, the Shangri La's meet the Stooges or Ronettes meet Ramones? We've heard that one before; many times, in fact. But they do it as well as any that we've heard of late. TTT are not a band as such, they're a duo – Aztoria (dreamy sighs) and Lee (scything guitar), with a little help from James (the tinny, tiny sound of drums being thumped in a galaxy, or a bedroom, far, far away). We're not sure who is responsible for the woozy atmospherics and the echoey production, but the ghosts of Kevin Shields and Joe Meek are there or thereabouts, although we would like to take this opportunity to emphasise that Kevin is very much alive. He's just lazy.
TTT haven't exactly been idle since they formed a few months ago. While holding down regular day jobs in customer relations (her) and freelance graphic design (him), they've been gigging furiously with the likes of the Pains of Being Pure at Heart, White Lies and the XX, and recording their debut double A-side single Candy Girl/You Wish You Were Red for the ultra-cool and indie-chic No Pain In Pop label, the home of the acclaimed Nite Jewel and New Band of the Day favourites Banjo Or Freakout. Now they'd like to hear their spectral guitar pop being sung by superstars. "I'd like to think that even Britney Spears could cover one of our songs and you'd still be able to see its melody shining through," they say, and somewhere Edwyn Collins is smiling.
The buzz: "Ghostly transmissions from another metaphysical plane, all ethereal angel sighs, which seem to settle on the music like a fog at dusk."
The truth: While we wait (and wait, and wait) for Kevin Shields to deliver new MBV material, or even revamped old MBV material, TTT will do nicely as junior stand-ins.
Most likely to: Be cute and cutting.
Least likely to: Wear ribbons and polka-dot dresses. Especially Lee.
What to buy: Candy Girl/You Wish You Were Red is released on seven-inch vinyl through No Pain In Pop on 14 September.
File next to: Vivian Girls, Crystal Stilts, the Pains of Being Pure at Heart,
Links: myspace.com/trailertrashtracys
Tomorrow's new band: AT8
