Breaking Artist: Does It Offend You, Yeah?

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Who: U.K. dance-rock act Does It Offend You, Yeah?, an oddly-named quartet who are already championed by the British press after perfectly melding infectious electronics and live instruments on their debut album You Have No Idea What You're Getting Into.

Sounds Like: An obnoxious, dizzying, perfectly of-the-moment blend of Daft Punk, Justice and Rage Against the Machine.

Vital Stats:

• The band got their polarizing band name from an episode of the British version of The Office. When the group was posting their first song on MySpace, Ricky Gervais' character said that line in the episode at the exact moment, and the name stuck.

• The band is not an overnight success — it actually took a couple weeks. Friends Dan Coop and James Rushent spent one weekend creating their first song, the distortion-heavy dance anthem "Battle Royale." Their friends liked it so much that the next weekend was spent creating another song. Then the labels came calling.

• The band patterns their live shows on Rage Against the Machine's high-energy sets. "It's the only band where the audience has to compose themselves before they clap," says Rushent. "That's what we aspire to: 'Don't come too close. It's a bit dangerous.'"

Hear It Now: You Have No Idea What You're Getting Into is out now. Click above for the band's video for the single "Rockstar."

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Song Stories

“Karma Chameleon”

Culture Club | 1983

Boy George has said this song was about standing by what you believe in. However, at the time, he was involved in a secret affair with Culture Club drummer Jon Moss. "Now people can understand the songs better," he said. "They were written about my relationship with Jon, and they were also written about being a gay man in a homophobic world." The lines "If I listen to your lies, would you say/I'm a man without conviction/I'm a man who doesn't know how to sell a contradiction," described his life at the time, he said. "I was selling this big lie."

More Song Stories entries »

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