Anyone coming into La Roux's debut album on the basis of recent hit In for the Kill might be forgiven for worrying that Ellie Jackson and her camera-shy sidekick Ben Langmaid may be drawing from a narrow range of influences. A cursory listen to all 12 songs on here should soon set them straight. La Roux's open-mindedness extends to all four of the bands that Vince Clark was in during the 1980s.

Joke, of course. Nevertheless, like most jokes there's enough truth in this one - enough, certainly, to shine a truthful light on an aesthetic shift that several emerging artists are bringing to bear upon their music. In recent months the likes of Little Boots, Magistrates and Passion Pit all cite the first wave of British synth-pop as a baggage-free source of inspiration. For the almost militant purity of its execution though, La Roux inspires a peculiar sort of awe. Exclusively using keyboards is one thing, but the Brixton-based duo have gone a step further, purging their sound of any keyboard noise that bears even a passing resemblance to what your Jeremy Clarkson sort of music fan would refer to as a “real” instrument.

And in limited bursts it yields results. There's no shortage of likely successors waiting to follow In for the Kill chartwards: the ecstatic machine pop of As if by Magic and I'm not Your Toy will surely get their turn. Right now, however, by adding that vital I Will Survive-factor, the current single Bulletproof stands every chance of killing two demographic birds with one stone. You don't sing a hook such as “This time baby/I'll be bulletproof” without ensnaring huge numbers of: (a) gay men; and (b) single female marketing executives in elasticated trouser suits who need something to listen to while waiting for their M&S “gastropub” meal to ping.

Similarly, relationship bother rears its head in the superb Quicksand. Propelled along by a melody that shares some of its DNA with Prince's When Doves Cry, Jackson casts herself as the recipient of an overture from someone already in a relationship. In this context, her dogged insistence on singing in a register that appears to be too high for her makes a certain amount of sense. She sounds vulnerable and exposed - although just one song previously, Tigerlily illustrates that there are other perfectly good octaves she might want to explore in years to come

Diversifying their sonic template is another prospect you suspect La Roux may have to reluctantly countenance at some point. Tempting as it is to build an entire body of work around the excited noise that synthesizers make when they hear their owners' keys in the door, history has shown us that such slavish loyalty to the sound can yield diminishing returns. When, after all, was the last time you bought an Erasure record?

But, of course, change is no less risky. Eurythmics - another big male-female duo in the pantheon of Eighties synth-pop - “progressed” by swapping circuit boards for horrible rock guitars, in the process, turning into a boring bloated betrayal of their early selves. Between these poles lies a quandary that La Roux may, in time, have to negotiate. Right now, however, it would take a curmudgeon of epic proportions to deny them their moment. Even if that moment did happen sometime between the death of John Lennon and the Falklands conflict.

(Polydor, TS £13.70)

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