MERGING THE SOUNDS of Kraftwerk, Depeche Mode and The Velvet Underground into a modern pop aesthetic, Ladytron rock like the 1990s never happened.
The British band were unwitting participants in the electroclash movement - the 21st-century version of 80s electropop that took influences from styles such as hip-hop, punk and hardcore - and are preparing to bring their message to the masses with a four-date tour of the mainland starting next Friday.
The tour has added significance for keyboardist Reuben Wu, who founded the band with fellow new wave fan Daniel Hunt in Liverpool several years ago, because his parents moved to Britain from Hong Kong about 30 years ago. 'It's not just the first time we've played China, it's the first time I've ever been to China. I have no idea what to expect apart from very good food,' Wu says.
Clad in identical androgynous uniforms with impossibly hip hair, Ladytron have fast become favourites among the fashionable elite of the design and style worlds. The group claims this has happened more by happy accident than intention. 'It's not 'chic', but it's definitely 'tongue-in-chic',' says Wu.
It all started when Wu and Hunt met through the Liverpool club scene with a shared love of analogue equipment, experimental electronic music and German new wave bands, and the lineup was completed when vocalists Helena Marnie and Mira Aroyo were recruited for the Ladytron cause.
The name came from a Roxy Music song - 'it just sounded right', says Wu - and the band set about recording and touring, but rarely playing live in Britain. Several critically acclaimed EPs laid the foundation for their 2001 debut album, 604, which is widely considered one of the definitive moments of the nu-electro faction. The band's second album, Light & Magic, followed in the winter of 2002, bringing Ladytron's angular utopian vision to an ever wider audience, and a third album is on the way.