NOUVELLE VAGUE

What could have turned into musical sacrilege - covering classic 80s indie and punk classics with a bossa nova/easy listening tempo - has turned into something of a minor triumph for the the two Gallic multi-instrumentalists/producers Marc Collins and Oliver Libaux who comprise Nouvelle Vauge. Over two albums (2004's eponymous debut and 2006's A Bande Apart), the duo have enlisted a coterie of female singers to add their louche touches to slight but compelling acoustic versions of everyone from Joy Division (Love Will Tear Us Apart)) to Yazoo, The Buzzcocks, Visage and Echo & The Bunnymen. Who'd have thought cocktail jazz could be this hip? Ni-ice.