My fellow Australians, let us speak of what makes this country great. Personally, the creative process of putting together these words to inform and entertain you is being fuelled by about half a packet of Chocolate Monte biscuits, and the makers of that fine product are reinforcing their national pride by putting together some local talent and tune of some quality to soundtrack their latest ad campaign. So yeah, that’s Dan Sultan and The Preatures’ Isabella Manfredi launching into Chisel’s Forever Now (Liberation) as they dunk their Tim Tams – handily tying with both of them having new albums recently extant, so everybody wins. And not sure if that’s the original backing track, or the campaign budget stretched to getting Mossy himself to do it, but whoever it is they get the high plains heat haze of that familiar guitar hook as well. Raise your Scotch Fingers high, and salute the nation.
A somewhat grumpier view of the world is that of Prophets Of Rage. Maybe they just need a few Tiny Teddies and a glass of milk? The rightly righteous conglomeration of elements of Rage Against The Machine, Public Enemy, and Cypress Hill continue their mission to ‘Unfuck The World’ with the bit-too-obvious pun of Radical Eyes (Fantasy), which fizzes off about the world at large as you’d expect. Chuck D has a yell, Tom Morello strangles his guitar in the prescribed manner, and then they probably wander off to have a few cones to calm down. Music might not be able to change the world as it once may have, but this will still allow you to shake your fist a bit and perhaps feel a bit better your shittiness with it.
Related ‘fun’ fact: when Damon Albarn got around to planning the latest Gorillaz record a year or so back, he started with the then-comical pretext that Trump might win the US election. Oh, how they all laughed. And now we weep. Anyway, the Humanz album eventually appeared, with all the necessary computer animations that mark the ‘band’, but somehow it doesn’t seem to have seeped into the mass consciousness as some of the previous works did. Has the novelty worn off, or were the songs just not quite as good? Latest track lifted from it, Strobelite (Parlophone), is a neat bit of electro music almost veering toward a disco pastiche, with the clip all suitably cartoony clever with cameos The Savages’ Jehnny Beth and Vince Staples, but regrettably not Noel Gallagher – which might have given a bit of a Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. But it’s not a Bruce Willis car chase, is it?
The National seem to be releasing their next album in bite-size instalments as well. The wonderfully-titled Carin At The Liquor Store (4AD/Remote Control) is the latest chunk, again probably harking back more to the studied weary relationship exhaustion of High Violet, rather than the denser feelings of Trouble Will Find Me, or Matt Berninger’s askance smirk of his ELVY sidetrack project. There’s the usual guilt and self-blame here as the singer clings to his mic stand for support, as the guitar and keyboard textures itch under your shirt. They remain the band whose questionings and doubts you can so easily get lost in.
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As much as Berninger and the Dessner & Devendorf brothers reveal themselves even through their mumbled angst, Gang Of Youths almost shout their existential struggles from the rooftops. If you’ve followed the story, you can absolutely understand how Dave Le’aupepe has found himself in a struggle for meaning in what he does, but as The Deepest Sighs, The Frankest Shadows (Mosy/Sony) reveals itself there’s almost a relief and release from him as he tries hard not to care about caring so much. He is left running endlessly – although you’re not even sure if he’s running to or from something. The album out next week will undoubtedly be weighty in its thought processes, and may provide some more answers.
The sly croon that Marlon Williams employs is different again – he’s the lounge lizard who sometimes catches sight of himself in the mirror and goes for a bit of self-deprecation as he recognises his own absurdity in the pose. Vampire Again (Caroline Australia) is the transplanted New Zealand innocent abroad wanting to be both part of and apart from the America he finds himself in. How do you achieve this? By going to the movies in LA dressed as Nosferatu, as the title suggests. It’s a social experiment in song – you might get beat up, pick up, or just be avoided. Marlon’s problem might be that he seems he’s not quite sure of which outcome he’s after. All this could seem just a little pretentious, except he’s got that helluva voice to carry it through on his intriguingly fragile bravado. Is it art? Ok, sure.
There’s no such artifice to as Didirri speaks of what’s going on in his heart and mind. Somehow Jude (Title Track) brings together threads of home and family – including an odd appreciation of the pluses and minuses of observing a relative with autism “letting the small things in life stress them out whilst the big things just keep sliding on with no stress at all”. Elsewhere, a dog jumps at shadows and – as the title suggests – some old Paul McCartney records are appreciated. At the very least, his is a voice of sincerity.
‘Sophisticated indie’ almost seems a contradiction in terms, but it was the phrase that came into my head as Self Talk’s Bedside Dictionary (Lost Boy/Inertia) unwrapped itself as it went. There’s an almost English mood and style to it, as Stacey’s urgency to tell you things appears to have some corners that might be ‘80s new wavey to start, but then sideswipes a decade later’s Britpop as affection grows as the right person says the right words to you and you find you’re attracted to their mind as well. And then you add a catchy chorus.
