Phwoar – now there’s a phrase you by no means thought you’d see aimed toward Elbow once more, eh? Such a comforting and common presence have the Manchester everymen grow to be during the last 17 years since their triumphant Mercury Prize win for the monolithic ‘The Seldom Seen Child’, that to think about them conjures up photos of Sunday roasts and Olympic victory montages. Alas, that ‘One Day Like This’ impact might have overwritten the general public notion of the band’s extra experimental nature.
From the trip-hoppy delights of debut ‘Asleep In The Again’, the weirdly fantastic art-rock of follow-up ‘Solid Of Hundreds’, the proto-arena widescreen ‘Leaders Of The Free World’ and all of their many curious prospers since, Elbow have by no means truly been the milquetoast ‘band you’ll be able to introduce to your nan’. Now tenth album ‘Audio Vertigo’ is right here to drop some spice in your pie and mash.
Earlier this yr, frontman Man Garvey warned us of an “inky” and “groove-based” file, leaning on their extra various influences of punk and new wave, of Stiff Information and Afrika Bambaataa. Opener ‘Issues I’ve Been Telling Myself For Years’ is a becoming taster of that palette: skittering and unpredictable, epic but somewhat bit naughty. Then lead single ‘Lover’s Leap’ is sexy – sexy, sexy, sexy. A meandering bassline leads us right into a rhythmic and boisterous ode to like and abandon; the graffiti on the park bench.
“Cool, actually cool,” beams Garvey over an interlude glimpse of them stretching themselves within the studio, earlier than he calls on his band to “give it fats broad wheels”. They oblige on the gnarly ‘Balu’ – the place synths meet horns and a complete lot of perspective, like a marching band en path to hell because the frontman idiosyncratically paints a raunchy evaluate: “You have been the B of the bang of the binge / Til I cut up for a tryst with a rust belt woman with a Plantagenet fringe.”
‘Very Heaven’ ain’t ‘One Day Like This’ half two because the title would possibly recommend, however simmering lounge jazz that calls to thoughts Belgian cult heroes dEUS, whereas ‘Poker Face’ appears like a go to to that horrible morning after as Garvey pines that he “can’t really feel like this any extra” over an intoxicating waltz. ‘Good Blood Mexico Metropolis’ is as shut because the album involves that ‘triumphant Elbow’ vibe, however now with an excellent deal extra hedonism.
“There’s no mild in my eyes, although there are lights within the sky,” sings Garvey on pulsing album spotlight ‘The Image’, hungrily feeding off the darkness as he continues: “There’s no cocaine on this cocaine”. All of it provides as much as the impish spirit of ‘Audio Vertigo’, significantly on the mischievous romance of ‘Knife Battle’. Know now that this file would be the grit within the oyster of their catalogue.
Having been dwelling with a vinyl test-pressing of ‘Audio Vertigo’ for some months now, let one guarantee you that it is a file to be loved in its fullest kind with all its hefty meat, mirrorball flashes and grizzly peaks. ‘Audio Vertigo’ is their finest file in years, and one to blow the cobwebs off some sleepy arenas this summer time.
Particulars
- Launch date: March 22
- File label: Polydor
