(Domino)
Bands can get a lot of
flack for championing literary tendencies but Wild Beasts are one
band that seems to revel in their highbrow allusions and have made
themselves a unique voice in British music for it. Not many bands
would have a single with a title like Brave Bulging Buoyant
Clairvoyants, and as such they can be filled next to These New
Puritans, another band whose lofty ambition have left them hard to
pin down with obvious genre labels.
The group really hit
their stride with the 2009's Mercury nominated Two Dancers and only
continued to mature with its follow-up Smother where they began to
explore the electronic tones that have come to the forefront of the
group’s fourth album Present Tense. As a result the band's sounds
has become a little colder and darker though like a film score
balances the mood of the lyrics of the two front men Hayden Thorpe
and Tom Fleming. Working with Brian Eno affiliated producer Leo
Abrahams, the group aimed to abandon guitars when they began writing
these song and though the instrument does still appear it is used
like the synthesizers that now make up the backbone of their sound,
creating texture and rhythm before melody.
Present Tense's
first track Wanderlust begins with the line 'We're decadent beyond
our means' though Wild Beasts are anything but decadent, showing
an almost machine-like economy in their songwriting. That's not to
say it lacks a human touch but it's efficient, not a second feels
wasted. Beginning with a heavy 3/4 drum beat that strikes with
robotic precision accompanied by choir of processed voices fill out
the track in a way that is equally epic and understated. It's
relentless motorik beat rides through the track unchanging holding an
urgency that underpins the drama that underpins the direct lyrics
'Don't confuse me with someone who gives a fuck'. There are
echoes of Bowie's Berlin period and new-wave alongside touches of
ambient electronica throughout Present Tense as the band
stretches out with smooth electric funk A Simple Beautiful Truth or
the spacious sound and filmic build of Pregnant Pause.
There are hooks and big
moments here, but they are counterweighted with the slight and
subtle. The vocals feel reigned in compared to previous albums,
though the melodies of Hayden and Tom still dance around like a
choreographed performance. There are very few bands that come up with
rhyming couplets like “There is a godless state/Where the real
and the dream may consummate” on Sweet Spot that sounds
downright poetic under Tom Fleming's weighty voice. The song feels
minimal, but there is a lot going on here between the airy guitars
and a simple but complimentary synth line that draws the song to its
end.
Wild Beasts are a band
whose song writing has gone from strength to strength and on this
album nothing seems out of place, like the audio equivalent of the
expertly framed shot a director like Kubrick would use with every bit
of the frame aiding the story, free of any unnecessary clutter. There
are no real chinks in the armour of this album, it remains cohesive
throughout, though its electronic tones and clean sounds can leave
you a little distant at times as if its almost too pristine and
meticulous. There is a clarity to the production, clean and clear.
With a strive for something smoother, this seems like the band's pop
album. Not that the band are aiming for the charts, but the end
result is cohesive and accessible. It makes Present Tense a
creative and rewarding listen from a band at the forefront of British
music.
Originally posted on figure8magazine.co.uk
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