Album Review: Calling All Cars - Raise The People

It's hard to nut out exactly what Calling All Cars were listening to when they embarked on writing for Raise The People (possibly some Electric Six and the latest batch of glossed-over pedestrian rock). This is the same heavy rocking trio that brought us Disconnect, Hold, Hold Fire and Reptile, all with a brute intensity courtesy of Haydn Ing's forceful growl and some neat but ball-busting heavy riffs. While the album still captures a sense of that cool intensity of former releases, it's such a radical change of direction it's just not the same Calling All Cars we knew before.

That said, Raise The People manages to do all the right things sonically and as a body of songs works through quite a range of structures and treatments that aren't unlikeable and are catchy. The title track is a dark, snappy opener, getting neat melodic rock lines pulsing under Ing's wail of former days, then they up the grinding ferocity on Good God! to Dixie punk on It Don't Matter. Singles Werewolves and Standing In The Ocean are the slickest movers on the album, dropping in twangy guitars and a muted vocal. One is reminded of Nine Inch Nails' successful transition into a more production-heavy sound with that same edgy grind, but sadly this threesome isn't yet on that lofty plane.

Whether fans pull up stumps with a “meh” is a gamble Ing and co clearly felt was worth taking.