When I was about 14 years old I bought two LPs from The Kinks in the clearance sales. The first one was called "Well Respected Kinks", but I don't remember the title of the second album. On the cover there was a picture of the four men sitting in a convertible and I think that Ray Davies was wearing somekind of psychedelic top hat. "A Dedicated Follower of Fashion" was one of the songs on this record and it is one of my all-time favourits. Another well-known song by The Kinks is "Dandy" and I had to think of both songs when I first encountered the band Fosca.
Dickon Edwards from London is a writer, dysfunctional dandy, flâneur, lyricist, DJ, and the frontman of Fosca. Besides Dickon the band consists of Rachel Stevenson, Kate Dornan and Tom Edwards. Vocals, guitar and synthesizer are the main instruments of this quartet, but the character of Dickon Edwards is the most striking thing of the band. With his bleached hair he reminds me of Bowie as The Thin White Duke. Dickon has been posting his diary on his weblog on internet for about ten years and as a 'dandy' he was featured in the Saturday issue of the Dutch paper NRC Handelsblad last week.
The music of Fosca is a mixture of Suede, Belle & Sebastian and Human League. They will release their third album "The Painted Side of the Rocket" on the But Is It Art? label in March, but they have already put the free downloadable live album "In Concert" online. You can find two examples below and the rest of the album can be found here.
>mp3: Universal Gatecrasher
>mp3: We See the World As Out Stunt Doubles