This year’s foppish next big things sound a lot like — last year’s. With their glass-shard guitars and panic-attack rhythm section, this multiracial London quartet unavoidably evoke onetime tourmates Franz Ferdinand—albeit without the seduce-and-abandon killer instinct. (A few roiling ballads suggest Interpol, whom they’ve also toured with.) Occasional flashes of brilliance transcend the déjá-vu pastiche: “Banquet” is a pogo anthem worthy of peak-form Blur, and “She’s Hearing Voices” is a suitably harrowing sequel to Joy Division’s maddened “She’s Lost Control.” Kele Okereke’s distressed yelps and Matt Tong’s merciless drumming set them apart from the pack of neo–New Wave contenders—if they come up with a less derivative manifesto next time, they could swing more voters their way.

DOWNLOAD: “Banquet,” “She’s Hearing Voices”