“Like a loaded gun, my love/I misplaced management of the wheel/Double-crossed by a neon capsule,” Cage the Elephant’s Matt Shultz sings on the title observe from the Kentucky band’s sixth album. The sound is acquainted, a sensible, subdued garage-rock swagger that’s a chief instance of their capability to punch up a throwback fashion. However the lyrics are removed from burnout boilerplate. A number of years in the past, Shultz skilled a psychotic response to prescribed remedy, and in 2023 he was charged with prison possession of a firearm. He described what he went via to Rolling Stone’s Ethan Millman as a “a nonstop horror movie.” Two songs earlier, on “HiFi (True Mild),” when Shultz sings “okay, I’m nice,” as his brother, rhythmic guitarist Brad Shultz, and lead guitarist Nick Bockrath maintain a Tv-like guitar convo, even that little bit of tossed off bravado appears pointedly freighted, as if that is music the place there isn’t a lot emotional house to breathe.
The method of what one other tune right here calls “shadowboxing disgrace and self-inflected mind-games” has given Cage the Elephant’s music a wanted urgency. Their final album, 2019’s Social Cues, circled round theme of rock stat malaise, a less-than-universal idea the band salvaged with a set of songs that cleverly blended Sixties traditionalism and Eighties revisionism. Clearly, the psychological pressure Shultz sang about has been put into sharper distinction by his current troubles. As soon as once more, they’re teamed with producer John Hill, whose Grammy-winning resumé (Eminem, Rihanna, and so forth) could appear considerably unlikely for a rugged, agile guitar crew. However his mild contact suits a pliable sound that shifts from the Seventies piano-pop introspect of “Float Into the Sky,” to the bare-knuckled glam-rap of “Good Time,” to “Rainbow,” a shot of salvation-seeking psychedelic soul-pop. As on Social Cues, the band pulls off a neat trick of historic transforming, usually suggesting a cool Southern rock band within the late Seventies who simply fell in love with U.Ok. punk and New Wave. “Ball and Chain” is a darkish guitar weave over a cuttingly murky groove. “Shy Eyes” seems like Iggy Pop making an album for Manufacturing facility Information in 1980.
What evolves amidst all of the album’s many style modifications is the sound of a band utilizing sounds they love to drag themselves via real-life drama. “Silent Image” is s breakneck picture of a life on the sting (“I don’t wanna give it some thought/I simply need the world to disappеar,” Shultz sings), set to tense drums and a searing guitar lead that stretches to the horizon even because the lyrics trace at oblivion. They finish the album with “Over Your Shoulder,” by which the band processes one other deeply private matter, the passing of Matt and Brad’s father. “Watching his picture ripple previous/Only a drop, life strikes quick,” Shultz sings over a somber acoustic guitar processional. It’s that sense of ache and perseverance that pushes this music past sensible trendy rock and roll into one thing deeper.
