Album Review: Crime & The City Solution - American Twilight

Reforming after two decades apart is tricky. Will all band members be keen? Has time wearied the creative spark? Do audiences care anymore? Anyone who caught Crime & The City Solution on their recent ATP shows will vouch for how amazing the band still sounds live and how exciting the potential of new material is. Does a new album solidify the band's greatness or just remind us of how terrific this Australian export once were?

Thankfully, the answer is resoundingly for the former. Simon Bonney's voice has barely aged a day, still channelling that unique, Australian muse on a drunken night. The part-new/part-old line-up doesn't sound drastically different from the one we know and love; the loose rock is rolling, passionate but subtle and steeped in Southern gothic rock ideals without being hammy.

Opener, Goddess, is a pleasurable if somewhat inauspicious start to the record, especially when placed ahead of brilliant album highlight, My Love Takes Me There, which is everything that's great about the group; poetic lyrics on the edge of haunting instrumentation, nostalgic for a lost Australian time. The Colonel provides the other peak track, showcasing the group's love of softer dynamics and barren soundscapes.

The album's title, American Twilight, implies a venture away from home for the group, though this is only half true. Despite an odd “my fellow Americans” lyric refrain in Riven Man, the album is quintessential Crime & The City Solution which, unfortunately, is part of its problem. Each of these eight songs is individually great - they just don't go beyond any of Crime's brilliantly established past boundaries. At 41 minutes, the album is lean, to the point and occasionally brilliant. A worthwhile, if familiar, addition to Crime's oeuvre.