Living Things - 'Black Skies In Broad Daylight' (Loog)
2/5
By: Thomas Hannan
This could be a dictionary definition of rock. We don't know what the Living Things look like, but we'll hope they've got huge hair, like putting their fists in the air and bang their heads to and fro when knocking out their riffs. If they don't, it's a crime.
Rock, then. Not particularly exciting rock, but rock nonetheless. 'Black Skies In Broad Daylight' is a record that, strangely, you can dislike, but still enjoy. Perhaps that's because it can be taken on an ironic level, not in the same sense as folk such as The Darkness (there's nothing in the least bit glamorous here), but at all turns it suggests cliché and a simplicity that will become annoying, but before that time, must raise a small smile at least.
It'll come as a blow to people who want to hold that Steve Albini simply doesn't work on bad records, because homeboy's behind the desk on this one. God knows why - it sounds nothing like any music you'd associate with him (probably the reason he's onboard, the nutter), his trademark growl almost completely absent. It's, well, polished - so clean you could eat your dinner off it. May we remind you, this is a rock album.
Yeah, a rock album that does everything it should, but just doesn't rock particularly hard. It's done as if by numbers - albeit with no killer solos, no anthemic choruses and crucially, no standout tunes. It's a mire of bland mediocrity. Compositionally, it's basic to the point of absurdity. You certainly don't get the impression that it's a debut that has been years in the making, one that's been slaved over, born out of a labour of love. Lyrically, it's much the same. Sentiments like 'all we need is love' or 'we don't need nobody' will be thrown in to be repeated to fade at the end of songs that the lines have very little, if anything, to do with. Not infuriating, just a little strange, somewhat out of place. You won't hate any of it, there's little here that will offend, in fact practically nothing that will raise any kind of strong emotion whatsoever.
Turn everything up. Play everything faster. Go with 'For Tomorrow We Die', that one's pretty good. More bass on everything, scream every lyric. Don't sound as if you're going through the motions. On 'No New Jesus', they even manage to sound bored with their own song. It's partly down to a vocal style that sounds as if it's whispering softly even when it's shouting. Bar nothing, every song could be improved by a mammoth degree by saturating it with something as simple as effort, as essential as passion. On 'I Owe', they at least sound as if they're having a laugh, and it saves another mediocre track from falling by the wayside.
It's not like we're asking for the most technically brilliant rock album ever made, it wouldn't suit the 'Things. But this is a debut, it's a passable one, it's just littered with too many obvious, niggling flaws, made more bothersome by (if we're honest), none of them actually being that bad. We know you're not stupid, guys. But perhaps you should be, more reckless at least. As it is, what we get is a big, dumb rock record that just isn't big or dumb enough.
Artists in this article: Living Things
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