Scale Model w/Hanzelle & Anchor Thieves: at The End (Nashville, TN) Fri. December 14, 2012

Scale Model w/Hanzelle & Anchor Thieves

Pop/Rock

Nashville Scene Critic's Pick …

The view is sweet, but gimme, gimme ground beneath my feet,” wishes Scale Model’s Megan Rox, capturing the essence of the uptempo New Wave dance beat on which she and her group whiz by. More than other local groups revisiting pop sounds from the ’80s, Scale Model uses New Wave’s synthesis of propulsive rhythms from krautrock and disco as a foundation (supplied by Scene photog Steve Cross behind the kit), letting Rox’s vocal melodies float on top like Nena or “Heart of Glass”-era Debbie Harry. Hanzelle reprises their role as the foil, bringing just as much kinetic energy, but with a bit more in the hip-dippin’ syncopated groove department. Anchor Thieves don’t play as much into the dance-off, bringing instead a ’90s alt-rock flavor that may not be unprecedented but is certainly no less competently rendered: On their latest, Malefactors, frontman Cayce Keller’s grade-A hooks are a perfect match for his malleable voice, equally suited to pleas as to kiss-offs.

—STEPHEN TRAGESER