It used to be tough being a band with artistic learnings. Quicker than you could say Scriti Politti, you were lumped in with earnest 1980s types who liked to name-drop philosophers in records with sleeves covered in stern graphic design. Just as you were dusting off your feather head-dress, you would be tagged a fashion victim, follower of faddish nonsense, like the electroclash blip of a couple of years ago.

But wanting to be more than "just"a band needn't mark you out as a po-faced egomaniac any more. The ever-savvy Jarvis Cocker led the way late last year with fake ghoul-perv outfit Relaxed Muscle. Now 2004's sheer art attack is a broad constituency that stretches from Franz Ferdinand in the commercial foreground, to the left-field delights of Pink Grease and the Sluts of Trust.

Franz Ferdinand are a Glasgow-based four-piece who formed around the city's art college. They have a manifesto. Founder-members of a collective of artists, they put on concerts as part of multimedia happenings - if other like minded bands such as I love Lucy or Sons and Daughters take part, so much the better. All of which would be insufferably pretentious were their self-titled debut not a pacy mix of jerky new-wave guitars and scorching keyboards. It's clever, rather than clever-clever.

Pink Grease are a Sheffield band who make sassy glam-rock with ludicrous Rock-Horror Show vocals. Equally exciting are garagey-blues duo the Sluts and Trust, a guitarist and a drummer from Scotland with interesting facial hair. Neil'sChildren, three moody-looking London 20 year olds who met at art college, occupy art-rock's political wing. Shouty guitar excitement and black clobber are their speciality.

Finally, the other best new art band in Britain are the camp fabulours Scissor Sisters. The singer-songwriter disco dollies are actually from New York but are releasing their album here first. British audiences, it seems, are more open to bands with a surfeit of ideas, angles and influences. Even - especially - if they look silly while they're at it


Craig McLean