I've been procrastinating writing this review of the latest SSPU album, and that's mainly because I'm struggling to know how to feel about it. Following on from most of their recent work I had very high hopes; Neck of the Woods I called a masterpiece when I reviewed it three years ago, Cannibal was a concise anthem, Nightlight and Circadian Rhythm seemed interesting enough. However on the first few listens I have to say I was underwhelmed, nothing leapt out like it had done with previous releases. I've had a practice in the past of avoiding listening to any new songs from a band until I can hear it with the rest of an album, so that it doesn't stand out because of my memory rather than its own merit. In this case I'm not sure it would have made much difference, I get the feeling they released Nightlight and Circadian Rhythm because they knew they were the better tracks on the album, and it wouldn't surprise me if they were written earlier.
Cradle (Better Nature)
The intro to the opener I think epitomises how this album misses the mark compared to Neck of the Woods, it feels hurried and almost done by checklist. For comparison's sake Neck of the Woods' opener Skin Graph takes 83 seconds whereas Cradle takes a mere 21 seconds. Altogether the guitar is carrying this song with a nice riff to introduce and later a cool solo while everything else was just being thrown at the speaker. The song builds to a chant of 'Better Nature' (at which point a certain amount of listeners would applaud and leave) but it doesn't seem to make any sense in the context of the song.
Connection, Pins and Needles, Friendly Fires
Tracks 2-4 bleed into one, and not in a good way; they're stand together as an indistinct blur, and whenever they build some momentum they shoot holes in their sails and take all but the vocals away. There is energy in these songs but it is wasted before it is used in a memorable way. Somewhere in the last year or so Brian Aubert has lost some of his knack for writing a good chorus, and that really hurts the song when everything drops out for you to sing it. For Pins and Needles the opposite is true where a good chorus doesn't have a good verse to back it up.
There might be a good song (possibly two) somewhere between these three tracks, but in their published state they are formulaic filler. They're fine to listen to, Brian's voice is still great as it is through the album, they get from A to B, but won't get many spins on their own at all.
Nightlight
It is when you hear the introduction to this fifth track that it suddenly dawns what has been missing, the tight basslines and drums that were the bread and butter of so much of their earlier work aren't being lost under a wall of synth and distortion. The anthemic chorus is one of the real highlights of the album and evokes the same uneasy, intenese air previous hits such as Panic Switch and Bloody Mary do.
Circadian Rhythm (Last Dance)
Similar to the previous track, the bass and drums are holding everything together as they should be. It's very much a tight in-and-out job, and doesn't linger about, so much so it's almost a pop song. Apart from that the notable thing about the song is that it is a pleasant laid-back duet between Brian and bassist Nikki Monninger. I see Nikki in a similar to light to R.E.M.'s Mike Mills insofar as I can't for the life of me work out why you don't hear more of either on vocals when they seem so capable whenever such duties are passed to them.
Tapedeck
At this point the Pickups seem to go on a jaunt of emulating recent indie bands. For example, Tapedeck definitely has a Alt-J-ish edge to it with its vibraphone intro, quirky drum beat and nasal vocals. It's a really cool song, with more vocals from Nikki as well. It then proceeds to plod around for about a minute and a half in the middle, then suddenly rescues itself by picking up some tempo and rocking for a minute and a half in a climax that is oddly reminiscent of Muse's Knights of Cydonia.
Latchkey Kids
In the last three tracks the lyrics become quite adolescent in theme and it sounds almost like it was written by Win Butler for The Suburbs, a reference to learning to drive or utterance of the word 'Neighbourhood' would remove any doubt. It's a rocker that like Circadian Rhythm is a concise, sub-four minute track but is let down by having another dropout instead of kicking up a gear when it should do.
Ragamuffin
When you look over a track listing, there's some titles that just look uninspired, like they cannot result in a good song. I thought it of Gun-Shy Sunshine on the last LP and it turned out to be the weakest moment on the album, what could a phrase like that even mean? Likewise, you read a title like Ragamuffin and wonder how they could get to a point where you think 'Fair enough, I see why they did that.' It's dark, and a little sparse but the tension doesn't quite build into a fitting denouement, and on a six minute track you can't afford to simply finish back where you started.
The Wild Kind
Again, it feels like they evoke Arcade Fire, almost imitating the wistful tone of Sprawl II, and the structure of Here Comes the Night Time to draw the album to a close. It's almost as if they're trying to telegraph where they think Arcade Fire will progress to post-Reflektor. It's a dreamy track that's a pleasant listen before building into a vivacious, electronic ending only to inexplicably return to square one for the album's final minute.
The most frustrating thing about it is you're a seasoned SSPU fan, you can hear what the songs could have been if they'd challenged themselves to go further off the beaten track instead of well-worn pop highways. By the same token maybe I was too generous on past albums and overlooked weak tracks, maybe my expectations were lower for their earlier albums. My two slightly optimistic takeaways from this, are that it's a fine album if you start at track five, and there is much to hope for coming after this transition record, it's the same band underneath after all, they just need to tidy up a little.
