It's what you might call the French paradox. In 2004, the three "electro slackers" in Sex In Dallas - two guys working the knobs and a girl singing upfront on stage - were based in Paris, but their first album Around the War was signed on leading indie German label Kitty Yo. Hence, the trio trekked off to live in Berlin - only to have their second album come out on the French label Recordmakers!

Adrien Walter, the only member of the original trio to have resurfaced in the new version of Sex in Dallas, has now teamed up with David Ducaruge and Mia von Matt  - aka German performance artist Billadol - to record a second album entitled Perpetual Emotion Maschine. And surprise, surprise, whereas Berlin's electro scene has become increasingly bogged down in repetitive loops for the dancefloor, Sex In Dallas stand out from the crowd with an album that is intelligently put together.

Things kick off on a fairly soft note with Hurry Congo, a track part-man, part-machine on which the trio serve up a driving mix of electronica and rock influences. Then things take a deeper, darker, disturbing turn on Forever Young, a dark and moody track saturated in Krautrock.

Tension builds almost imperceptibly as the album progresses. And once the hedonistic Hit Back Bow is over, we slide right down to the depths of obscurity, the mood only lightened by Biladoll's bitter-sweet vocals adding a welcome touch of pop here and there. The Freaks, the penultimate track on the album, builds to a strident climax, serving up three and a half minutes of deafening dance rock where the trio go completely and utterly wild.

Sex in Dallas slow mood and tempo as their album draws to a close, however, concluding with the relatively soothing Until the End. If you ignore the terrible album cover and the almost unreadable accompanying booklet, Perpetual Emotion Maschine is an album to be highly recommended to electro fans everywhere.