Album Review: The Twilight Sad with a smile

Rock Action

The Twilight Sad have always done what it says on the tin.

For four albums now the Kilsyth-formed band have taken a dense miserablist rock path full of alienation and introspection but without ever overtaking their influences in the public's consciousness.

You will see them share a festival with The Cure and Interpol and perhaps, lower down the order, they suffer from the all two obvious comparisons.

The cover for this their fifth album might point to more of the same.

It is a beautifully abstract picture of a man and woman seemingly embracing each other; all blacks, whites with dashes of blood red and is just what would be expected.

Some of the finest art in popular culture has been dark and oblique, but it is too easy to make gloom remain just that, gloomy.

While it has been five years since Nobody Wants to Be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave it appears that having joined Mogwai's Rock Action label and recruiting touring member, ex-The Blue Nile keyboardist Brendan Smith, the band have if not exactly lightened up, certainly set a more varied dynamic tone all round.

While angst has always been part of the Twilight Sad DNA, the beauty of their fifth album is that the dark and sometimes impenetrable is now underpinned with a lighter touch, a killer melody here, a throbbing synth there, a hooky tense guitar riff elsewhere.

The band say they were not under pressure to frontload this with 'hits' but that sounds like kidology.

The opener [10 Good Reasons for Modern Drugs] starts things off with a bang. A monotone synth loop underpins what is a dark and passionate paean with a euphoric payoff.

Track two Shooting Dennis Hopper Shooting brings the band out of the gloom with a thumping grunge-y thrash-up that you can picture James Graham prowling around the studio to, as he delightfully over-accentuates that Glasgow accent bellowing: "I saw you kill him on the back stairs. No it's not fair."

It's their most exhiliratingly inviting song yet and must surely bring the house down at their sell out gig at the Glasgow Barrowlands on March 2.

If the departure of founding member Mark Devine in early 2018 might have shaken the band's confidence and spirit of adventure, there is no sign of that on this self-produced album.

The Arbor takes the band to familiar grey territory which will resonate with diehard fans, but while they may once may have got lost in a one pace dense haze, there's space to allow a transforming haunting synth. Icy? Check. Atmospheric? Check again.

Similarly VTr takes the band into 'for the fans of Interpol' sphere, albeit the US masters of doom would have killed for the hooks on this for their latest disappointing affair.

The luscious Sunday Day 13 twinkles through the album's mellower side until last year’s early album track taster I/m Not Here [Missing Face] bumps up the bpms with it's irresistible melody and cunning, cutting earworm lines. "You're too close for comfort. You're too close to comfort me," will no doubt be chanted with gusto at their live shows.

Auge/Maschine creates a familiar meandering soundscape before a buzzsaw guitar crescendo resuscitates the track, and surges onto another more rousing path.

Final track Videograms, the first to be written for the album and seen by Graham as one of the most melodic songs they have done, lacks the varying dynamics of the best on offer here and is a limp sign off.

Nevertheless what the band achieve overall is musically less standoffish and insular. It's an album that invites you to hear what it has to say, even though it might be unpalatable.

You could say, musically, The Twilight Sad might just have found their smile.

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Speaking of the track Videograms, frontman James Alexander Graham said: "Since writing the song I’ve heard the phrase "don’t you start on me” whilst walking down the street, in the supermarket, in the pub. It must have been something that I’d heard a lot that stuck with me and came out in this song.

"I quite like that it's the first official single yet it's the last song on the album. There’s sometimes pressure to front load an album with the singles as it's assumed that people don’t have the attention span to listen to a full record, but people that know us and like our music know that we make albums that should be listened to all the way through as every song is a chapter in the overall story of it. It's also why I love Rock Action as there was no pressure from them, they let us do what we wanted with the track list.

“From the actual coming together of the demos to recording the final versions of these songs has probably been one of my favourite experiences of being in the band.

“It’s a dark record but I think there are some uplifting moments to be had too. There are so many extremes here – there are moments that are harsh, then others that are quite melodic and others that are stripped right down. This album definitely comes with the extremes of every side of the band, I think. There’s a certain direct openness and candour now but at the same time I want to keep some mystery. We don’t like to throw things in people’s faces and spell it out for them.”