Album Review: The Vines - Wicked Nature

Ah, Craig Nicholls, you tricky little monkey you. You always manage to suck us in on the initial pretence of blood boiling rock fury (Get Free, Ride, Gimme Love, etc.), and then when we commit ourselves to listening to an entire Vines record – in this case a double-disc, 22-track monster – you leave us out in the cold with nothing more than a bunch of thin ballads to try and use for kindling.

Perhaps that’s not entirely true – there are some absolutely stomping smash-and-grab cuts scattered about Wicked Nature (Out Of The Loop, Psychomatic, Everything Else, Metal Zone) – the type of songs The Vines moniker has survived on. However, you’ve got to push through some pretty boggy ground to get to these solid patches.

Most of the ballads are middling, some are respectable, others are genuinely snore-worthy. Nicholls himself sounds like he’s about to nod off during the chorus of Venus Fly Trap, and it’s hard not to do the same. The volatile lynchpin has employed a new rhythm section in the form of The Griswolds pair Tim John (bass) and Lachlan West (drums), and unsurprisingly, the boys also sound at their best when there’s a bit of urgency surrounding them.

Even though there’s twice as much Vines to dig into here, the results are still the same as they’ve always been – genius moments are brought undone by some undercooked songs. Nicholls has the songwriting ability and playing chops to make a monumental garage rock album; sadly, it seems like he just doesn’t want to.