Growing up is hard to do, especially if you're bis, a band that made its reputation promoting something called "Teen-C Power" and producing infectiously frisky pop songs with bitter lyrics about the inherent dishonesty of adults and the indignities of adolescence.
Nevertheless, the Glasgow trio's second album, "Social Dancing," is an impressive advance from their internationally admired debut, "New Transistor Heroes," which was released in 1997. Most of the songs on "Heroes" had been written while the band members were still in their late teens and are infused with the confidence of self-righteous youths who know they're on a creative roll. Unhindered by a lack of technique and sophisticated equipment, bis used rhythm boxes and toy keyboards to realize their musical ideas, most of which were borrowed from the louder/faster school of late '70s new wave.
The new album is just as assured as the debut, but moves further into dance territory, more specifically '80s disco and techno. The first single, in fact, is called "Eurodisco," and contains the bouncing bass lines and twittering synths that characterize that particular genre, while the lyrics play off the band's thoughts on the direction it's taking, alternating calls to "pump it up" with the self-questioning, "Is this a new beginning?"