Of all the disparate topics that occupy far too many column inches on ANBAD - woeful puns; finding new ways to introduce yet another Scandinavian pop band; cramming in tenuous, self-serving links to new blogs about terrible cover versions – pure, simple FUN! is the one that pops up the most.

Fun is great. I love fun. But lots of bands hate it. Fun is not cool. Contrast the number of bands that make fun music with the number of po-faced, serious, yeah? ones. The embarrassing scoreline would read Fun: Beastie Boys circa ‘License To Ill‘, Serious: Everyone Else, ever.

The two camps are firmly entrenched, and ne’er the twixt shall meet. Well, they do occasionally: enter Panda Party.

Panda Party // Defiance! Protect Me

A song called Defiance! Protect Me and its talk of ‘torture, thunder and gunfire’ and ‘making martyrs’ doesn’t scream jelly, ice-cream and jolly japes, but the music that the sombre lyrics bubble along on does.

Such complex interplay. It sounds like a recipe for something worse than disaster, but astonishingly the band pull it off. The music leaps and frolics, coiling and curdling; the lyrics gaze at the navel – part introspection, part narcissism, partly trying not to giggle along with the glee-filled tune.

But why would you expect anything else, really? The band is called Panda Party, and their songs have exclamation marks in the titles. These are men not to be wholly trusted. A surprising and pleasant end to the week.

www.pandaparty.co.uk