STACK #187 May 2020

MUSIC REVIEWS

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The 1975 Notes on a Conditional Form Opening with Greta Thunberg imploring the listener to “please wake up” and join a grassroots movement to halt climate change, Notes on a Conditional Form states its intent plainly. Over three LPs, Matty Healy et al. have built a powerful parasocial relationship with their fans, not just based on excitement over their eclectic and far-reaching songwriting, but an essential spirit of compassion and curiosity. Which makes Conditional Form an easy album to love: deeply exploratory not just in style, the album feels like an attempt to capture all the beauty in the world. Ironically, although Thunberg pleads “now is the time to speak clearly,” Conditional Form doesn’t, in the single-minded sense. It’s gloriously messy. But it does turn itself towards an idea of a world worth saving. (Sony) Jake Cleland

Car Seat Headrest Making A Door Less Open

Making A Door Less Open sounds unlike any of Car Seat Headrest‘s 11 previous records, with a drum machine and samples largely replacing full band arrangements. With this shift in direction, songwriter Will Toledo establishes a completely new character called Trait, a persona which came out of his side project 1 Trait Danger with Car Seat Headrest bandmate Andrew Katz. Toledo‘s sardonic lyricism hasn‘t been lost however, coming to the surface when Trait relays a desire to take up weightlifting or while expressing a disdain for Hollywood culture. Despite stemming from personal experience, Toledo‘s lyrics reflect widely felt modern anxieties, while his desire to reinvent himself feels symbolic of a generational restlessness. (Matador Records/Remote Control) Holly Pereira

Custard Respect All Lifeforms Custard‘s eighth album concludes with a

contemplative track called Come Tuesday . “Stay the course and you‘ll be right,“David McCormack advises as the record ends. “Stay the course and you‘ll survive.“Not only has this Brisbane band survived – after a hiatus at the start

of the 2000s – but they have thrived. Likeable but not lightweight, Respect All Lifeforms is as good as anything they‘ve done during their 30-year career. The album successfully blends three voices – McCormack, drummer Glenn Thompson and bass player Paul Medew – and showcases a range of styles. A cover of Camper Van Beethoven‘s Take The Skinheads Bowling , an absurdist dream, sounds like a Custard song, while McCormack‘s wistful Harlequin Records is a Beatlesque piece of pop perfection that looks longingly at the days of “buying a cassette from a record bar.“Thompson‘s Talkative Town is a psychedelic jumble of musings on modern life, while Medew‘s Wishing is a blistering 1.47-minute slice of space-age punk. And Custard‘s trademark self- deprecation is on show in the penultimate track, Watcha Waiting For , which starts, “And there is no way that anybody‘s still here.” But make sure you stick around for the duration. Respect All Lifeforms is a triumphant pop treat. (ABC/Universal) Jeff Jenkins

All Time Low Wake Up, Sunshine

The Strokes The New Abnormal

Sleaford Mods All That Glue

Steve Earle & the Dukes Ghosts of West Virginia Steve Earle’s 20th studio album was recorded at Jimi Hendrix’s legendary Electric Lady Studios in NewYork City with his band The Dukes. Based around the Upper Big Branch coal mine explosion that killed 29 men in 2010, making it one of the worst mining disasters in America’s history. Earle was approached by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, the playwrights responsible for Coal Country , a theatre piece about the disaster. In the play, Earle features as “a Greek chorus with a guitar” who is on stage for the entire play offering personal, historical and social context through 7 of these songs. In true Earle style, a wholehearted, outspoken voice of the people. (NewWest Records) Denise Hylands

Having grown from brattish pop-punk heartthrobs into Springsteenish heart-on-sleeve belters, Wake Up , Sunshine places All Time Low in a league with Green Day as statesmen of Rock. Full of energy and urgency, the bone-cracking drumming of Rian Dawson (which has always served to staple All Time Low’s songs to the forehead) is prominent. But it’s Alex Gaskarth’s changing vocals that’ve developed the most, delivering heartfelt ballads as convincingly as searing punk blasts. Even at 15 tracks, Wake Up, Sunshine never drags, scrolling through ideas seamlessly enough that they never seem

Not even the Strokes were immune to the destabilising forces of last decade, trying to find footing among mixed reviews and various sideprojects. But their entry into this decade has them sounding fully comfortable in their abilities. Leaning into earworm grooves even when the album’s at its drum machine- iest, The New Abnormal has a rhythmic bedrock from which to blend post-punk, new wave, synth pop, and brash noise. Casablancas’s laconic vocals are apt as ever as the character of The Strokes’ often droll perspective, aimed at corporate didacts, wasteful nostalgia, and the separation from a partner that takes a new sense of familiarity in the pandemic era. Eerily prescient in its themes, The New Abnormal is the Strokes with finger firmly on pulse. (Cult/RCA) Jake Cleland

A 22-track collection of fan favourites, B-sides and unreleased gems spanning across seven years of in-yo‘-face Sleaford Mods output, All That Glue brings anyone who was tardy to this Nottingham punk duo‘s party up to speed. Gutter poet Jason Williamson spits vitriol that‘s never devoid of humour ( Fat Tax : "The Fresh Prince of Bell-End“– genius!) over Andrew Fearn‘s intricate, idiosyncratic, robotic beats. Scratch‘n‘sniff-style, the cover art – which features an illustration of a urinal with butted-out ciggies in trough, reminiscent of Dada artist Duchamp‘s sculpture Fountain – could borrow its aroma from album track Tied Up In Nottz ‘s lyrics: "The smell of piss is so strong it smells like decent bacon.“If you put Alexei Sayle in a blender with early Sigue Sigue Sputnik beats, Sleaford Mods would spew out. And we‘re 100% here for it. (RoughTrade/Remote Control) Bryget Chrisfield

short on something to say. (Fueled By Ramen/Warner) Jake Cleland

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MAY 2020