POP MUSIC REVIEW : EMF Is Hot--and Cold--in L.A. Debut

U nbelievable!

The British band EMF had the audience shouting that title word on cue as it played its recent No. 1 hit at the Hollywood Palladium on Friday. But at the group’s L.A. big-concert debut, a slightly different word was the operative adjective:

Unreliable!

Coming into town as one of the hottest rock arrivals of the year, the quintet began its Palladium show with “Children,” an anthem of reassurance and affirmation addressed to a new generation. It’s a song fueled by a sense of awakening and deepened by an insistence that hard lessons must be endured.

With the band seemingly charged by its own momentum and the crowd bouncing to the clamorous beat, the concert began at a high pitch and it appeared to be on the way up from there.

And instead of using the big hit as a carrot to lead the audience on by saving it for the end, EMF pulled out “Unbelievable” four songs into the show as an explosive charge to kick things up yet another level.

But if the youthfulness that yields all that energy and urgency has a drawback, it’s inexperience and a lack of musical range--both of which contributed to a sudden deflation of the show’s energy. Songs started sounding repetitious (EMF tends to recycle a couple of basic patterns), and instead of rounding out the mood, a pair of slow songs applied the brakes--a condition noted by singer James Atkin, who announced, a little late, “We’re getting a bit too subdued here.”

EMF cranked it up again, but never quite recaptured that early excitement, even with a reprise of “Unbelievable” during the encores.

It’s understandable that they’d return to that song--in addition to EMF’s typical drive, it sports a brutal guitar riff, a series of escalating rhythmic hooks and open spaces for Atkin’s insinuating, scornful vocals. But the absence of anything nearly as catchy is a sign of the group’s short tenure. Well, it’s nothing that a few good songwriting sessions can’t remedy.

Though operating independently of Britain’s high-profile rock movements, EMF has much the same sense of freedom and ferment that marks Manchester’s dance music and the manic eclecticism of London’s Jesus Jones.

Like the latter, EMF’s potential lies in its fundamentals: The electronics are secondary to the rhythm section’s firm rock underpinnings (drummer Mark Decloedt, not the computer, powered the beats Friday), and the textures are subservient to the voice and the song. The multiple-jointed rhythms--propulsive and taut, but also free and loose--are compelling, but EMF’s best work would still register emotionally even stripped down to just singer and tune.

Though the pacing was spotty Friday, EMF appeared to be getting below the surface and doing some serious bonding with its young audience. As a rock icon, Atkin is still forming his persona, but he showed an easy, natural command of the crowd as he blended traces of rock arrogance, punk hostility and disarming sweetness.

His slightly wobbly singing gives him the air of a regular bloke, and culturally he seems to have one foot in the traditional pub and the other in the modern dance club. The unification of those two strains could be one of ‘90s rock’s significant upheavals, and EMF just may be the band to pull it off.