Quite aside from the ridiculous pseudonyms ‘The Dragon’ and ‘The Atmosphere’, and the repetition of ‘duke’ in both band name and album title, the first track opens with nearly a whole minute of drum beats and disc scratching that creates a similar effect to scraping 10 foot nails down a chalkboard; it was painful.

However, my perseverance was rewarded. As the album gets going, it seems to find its feet, with each song superseding the one that preceded it, making this a largely enjoyable listen. Aside from ‘Erotic Robotic’, with its bizarre repeated lyric ‘Erotic robotic, despite the accent we’re Scottish’, I cannot say that I disliked any of the tracks on the album. My favourite track was easily new single, ‘Rubber Lover’. It opens with a repeated synthesised drum beat and riff that tips its cap to one-hit-wonder summer soundtracks that makes you want to whip out the BBQ and hit the beach. This background drops out the moment the vocals come in, progressively getting louder and louder until the chorus, by which point you are on your feet and ready to dance. Another personal favourite was "Skin the Mofo Alive", with the random incorporation of steel drums alongside electronic vocals and bass giving this a distinctly hybrid feel, originating somewhere between the Caribbean and Tokyo. Also worth a listen are ‘Silhouettes’ and eclectic genre mixing track ‘Demon’.

However, my struggles to categorise Marmaduke Duke beyond unspeakably pretentious clichés continued through the entirety of the record. They claim to be the lovechild of rock and electronica, but somehow this does not quite cut it in my opinion. Each track is so disparate from the last that it is only possible to tell that they are written and performed by the same band because of the unmistakeable vocal talents of Simon Neil and JP Reid. I am still unsure whether I can reconcile this disparity, and I am even less sure whether or not it really matters in the long run. The more I listen to Duke Pandemonium, the more I notice how well crafted each song is: perhaps this disparity is what makes this such an enjoyable album, for each song stands as a separate entity from the previous and upcoming song, fully functional outside the context of the album.

So despite my preconceptions and genre-wrestling, I was actually widely impressed by this record in the end. It is not an album that instantly screams greatness, but it definitely grows on you with each listen if you aren’t put off by the sheer randomness of it. And, if you give it a chance, it will certainly be an album that will become imbedded with memories of sunshine and road trips of 2009!