Turnstile ’Glow On’ – Review

When Turnstile recently broke into the Billboard top 30, it was an almost unprecedented achievement. There have been some great Hardcore and Post-Hardcore bands to emerge in the last few years years – Gulch, Touché Amore, The Armed, Soul Glo, Nuvolascura, Stay Inside – but none that have gained the crossover success of Turnstile. The band’s sound is not unprecedented; In the early 90’s, Hardcore bands, particularly those based in NYC, routinely found ways of melting grooves and pop melodies into their salty thrash. Turnstile don’t particularly do anything that, say, Snapcase and Black Train Jack didn’t back then. The difference is that Turnstile write songs that actually stick. This is about more than a sound or a style or an attitude. The songwriting is sharp. Their ambition is clear. Their taste is refined and varied. On just about every level Turnstile are both more palatable, and simply better, than the competition.

Third album ‘Glow On’ is the band’s most daring record to date, at the same time as being their most direct. There are plenty of highlights spread out over its 14 tracks, though the first half is where the most potent numbers can be found. Opener ‘Mystery’ arrives from out of space, with gurgling sounds and arpeggiating synths. This song, like others on the album, reads like a direct response to the pandemic and lockdown. In the chorus, vocalist ‘Brendan Yates asks ‘It’s been so long, is all the mystery gone?’ The subsequent half hour of bangers feels like a direct response to that very question.

‘Blackout’ is a love letter to gigging; one written in sweat. Its potency is intensified by the circumstances of its creation. Hurtling out of lockdown, the song celebrates the connection between fan and musician. When Yates belts ‘let the spotlight shine on meeeeeeee’ he yells it like he’s exhaling the last 18 months of restrictions, accelerating the song from verse to chorus like a singer possessed. When the band recently performed the song at a hometown show, some audience members sang back the guitar lick, while others ran on stage only to hurl themselves back into the crowd. Turnstile love the live experience, and it’s a feeling that’s reciprocated by their fans. ‘And if it makes you feel alive, well then I’m happy to provide’, Yates sings in the chorus. It’s an anthem born in captivity that’s just gagging to be set free.

The band gobble their way through the lineage of punk rock while finding unexpected diversions along the way. ‘Humanoid/Shake It Up’ is like a meticulous approximation of ‘Too Tough to Die’ era Ramones until it unexpectedly slows into a dizzying chug. It’s here that they most sound like the Turnstile of old. On ‘New Heart Design’ they sound more like The Smiths or even The Police – the guitar hooks are as dreamy as the bleached-pink sky on the front cover.

For the audiophiles out there, ‘Glow On’ sounds incredible. There is, of course, something to be said for grotty, lo-fi punk recordings but, equally, sometimes it pays to hire the guy who wrote and produced ‘In Da Club’ to sit behind the boards. Mike Elizondo truly elevates ‘Glow On’ above and beyond any other rock record released this year. The guitar tones, so rich and referential, are sublime. The drums do more than just drive the songs forward – they catapult them through your speakers. Yates’ vocals are magnetic. He can shout with the best of them but he’s equally adept at adopting a rapper’s cadence or leaning into the melody in ways that feel surprising.

Turnstile regularly incorporate (relatively) unusual sounds from diverse genres into their songs, sometimes successfully (the samba breakdown in ‘Blackout’, the hair metal licks of ‘Don’t Play’, the dreamy burbles of ‘Mystery’) and sometimes less so (the two r&b kissed collaborations with Blood Orange are the weakest moments here). It would be unfair to suggest that this is entirely novel for a hardcore band, but what does impress is the ease with which Turnstile generally bridge the gap between disparate styles. The album breaks down ever so slightly towards the end, as the slower tempos and reduced song lengths start to undersell the band’s strengths, but it’s still remarkable that Turnstile have the vision to attempt to tie so many threads together.

It’s hard to overstate just what a blast ‘Glow On’ is. Above and beyond it’s subtle innovations, or its incredible production,  it works on a very visceral, immediate level. It well and truly blasts the cobwebs away, so to speak. Turnstile’s sound isn’t so far removed from Red Hot Chili Peppers, Faith No More or Jane’s Addiction; bands that transcended their initial genre based limitations to make records that resonated with a wide audience. If Turnstile don’t make the same enormous breakthrough then it won’t be for want of trying. 

9/10

Drake ’Certified Lover Boy’ – Review

There’s a great antidote in Paul McCartney’s new Disney plus documentary where the former Beatle describes penning ‘Michelle’ as a means to impress bohemian art students at parties in his pre-fame days. An interpolation of the ballad feels like the fitting choice to open Drake’s hilariously titled sixth album ‘Certified Lover Boy’. Drake’s entire career has felt like one long, increasingly desperate, pick up line. Though there are highlights peppered among the album’s 22 tracks – which is too many by far – there are not enough to make ‘Certified Lover Boy’ feel anything like a return to form. The album is a slog; a data dump of material designed to maximise streaming revenue.

Ultimately there’s nothing as hooky as ‘Headlines’ or as catchy as ‘Hotline Bling’, though equally there’s nothing as cynical as ‘Tootsie Slide’, or as risible as ‘Worst Behaviour’. It just feels a little tame. Then again, Drake’s never sampled Right Said Fred before, and he does here, over a trap beat, which is… Drake is 34. At what point does this become a little embarrassing? I mean Future and Young Thug jump on the track and they seem pretty into it, so maybe there’s some merit that I’m missing. Same with ‘Girls Want Girls’, which is currently number one; I personally find it all a bit petulant, not to mention confusing (‘say that you a lesbian girl, me too’). But it’s hard to deny the way Drake pops his way between beats; so nonchalant and effortlessly capable if lacking in real passion. At this point Drake will do what Drake does and he’ll do a lot of it. His vices – the very things can make you cringe – are also his virtues. The aforementioned ‘Girls Want Girls’ may indeed be *groans* but it’s also irresistibly moreish.

The album’s tone is notably less varied than ‘Views’ or ‘Scorpion’, and also less cohesive than ‘Take Care’ or ‘Nothing Was the Same’. There’s a mood, a predictable one, and Drake never seems interested in prodding or disrupting it. Equally, he never really burrows down into it. It’s just a bit monotonous. Noah ‘40’ Shabib once again oversees proceedings, and his aesthetic style – steely, dark, subtle – dictates the entire album, even the numbers he had no direct hand in producing. I prefer the bright tracks – ‘Fair Trade’ is great fun, so is ‘7am on Bridal Path’, which contains easily the most incisive wordplay and interesting rhymes on the album. 

A few weeks ago Kanye dropped ‘Donda’, then the fastest selling album of 2021, and it’s fitting that Drake should upstage it just one week later. Afterall, who else if not Drake can match Kanye in the egotist stakes? Who else has done so much to sculpt hip hop in their image? ‘Certified Loverboy’ is a whole lot less audacious than ‘Donda’ but It’s a more palatable listening experience all in all. But both records are bloated beyond belief and suggest a disconnect with the very audience that made them stars. Like Kanye, Drake is more and more leaning into his most divisive personality traits, almost to the point of collapse. He seems increasingly set on presenting the worst version of himself and while ‘Certified Lover Boy’ isn’t the worst Drake album, it does feel like the least forgiving.

Sometimes you just have to throw your hands up and say ‘I’ve changed, not you.’ In 2010/11 There was something about Drake being the underdog, an unknown on the rise, that made you root for him. His flaws and vulnerabilities just made him seem more human, particularly when so many rappers back them seemed relatively out of touch. The same can’t be said of rappers today, largely because of Drake’s direct influence, and in this context he now sounds immature, so much more cruel, and utterly exhausting, even if on the face of it he hasn’t actually changed much at all. And maybe THATS the point: he hasn’t changed at all.

5.5/10

Review Roundup

The Killers ‘Pressure Machine’

With last summer’s ‘Imploding the Mirage’, The Killers made their best album in years by doubling down on their wilder tendencies. Like a football manager who knows that attack is the best form of defence, the band bombarded you with all manner of brilliant riffs and ridiculousness. That they manage to keep the quality level just as high on ‘Pressure Machine’, even as they scale back and strip away the bombast, speaks to how good this band have become. Brandon Flowers made so many positive gains on ‘Wonderful Wonderful’ and ‘Imploding the Mirage’ by turning the lens on himself, dissecting the effects of fame and success on his family’s mental health but here he does something else just as successfully. He returns us to weird, wild, small town America and unpacks the locals’ struggles from an outsider’s perspective. The opioid crisis, suicide, homophobia, systemic boredom – these are the issues that Flowers gets in the weeds with. These intimate tales about interior struggles feel more authentic and complex than Flowers previous character studies, particularly highlight ‘…’ which contends with an abusive husband and vengeful cop. Occasionally the writing is a little clunky, just as the music can sometimes feel overwrought, but a little clunkiness has become Flowers’ calling point at this point. It’s no longer a detriment. The Killers have been one of America’s biggest bands for years – at this point, who would argue against them being one of the best as well?

7.5/10

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Foxing ‘Draw Down the Moon’

A couple of years ago, Foxing frontman Eric Hudson tweeted that the 1975 were ‘cringe’, ‘manufactured’ and ‘fake af’. I point this out, only because Foxing’s infectious new single ‘Go Down Together’ sounds just like a 1975 song. Perhaps it isn’t surprising that at this point in their career Foxing would seek a more profitable sound, after all, even emo bands have to pay the bills. Not that I mean to be cynical. I’m sure there is artistic intent and genuine enthusiasm behind this album, it just so happens that on ‘Draw Down the Moon’ Foxing manage to sound like Grouplove, Foster the People, MGMT, Imagine Dragons, Passion Pit and, yes, The 1975 – y’know, the last bands that experienced actual chart success before everything seemed to change for guys with guitars. It’s a familiar sound that makes ‘Draw Down the Moon’ simultaneously easier to like and harder to love than their emotionally exhausting emo classics. Songs like ‘Beacons’ and ‘Cold Blooded’ have soaring hooks and previously unlocked energy. The songs are generally bright and catchy, even if their inexperience in this arena tells in the album’s muddy mix and saturated dynamics. The record is well structured, anthemic… a little safe? But a kind of ‘safe’ that was really last applied a decade ago. And in that sense, perhaps Foxing are actually taking a gamble.

7/10

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Big Red Machine ‘How Long Do You Think it’s Gonna Last’

Big Red Machine is the name given to the partnership between The National’s Aaron Dessner and Bon Iver’s Justin Veron. If you’re a fan of either act, it’s hard to imagine you not getting something out of ‘How Long Do You Think it’s Gonna Last’. Equally, you won’t be at all surprised by what they’ve conjured up. The biggest thrill it provides is in hearing Vernon sing songs with recognisable narratives and messages; we’ve become so used to his increasingly elliptical, surreal stream of conscious style that it’s refreshing to hear him in a less adorned setting. In this sense the album feels both more instantly gratifying and ultimately less captivating than his work with Bon Iver. These songs grabbed my attention immediately but their grip didn’t hold for long. Perhaps it has something to do with hearing fifteen melancholic ballads strung together unceremoniously. In isolation any one of these songs is a perfectly designed and emotionally affecting thing but their impact is dulled in close proximity. 

The guests who appear frequently are all very successful artists in their own right but they’re also exactly the kind of artists you would expect to find on a Big Red Machine record. Anyone who spent any amount of time in the company of Taylor Swift’s ‘Folklore’ and ‘Evermore’ will not be surprised by the quality of ‘Renegade’ but it’s more than possible that we’ve reached saturation point for Taylor and Aaron’s very specific blend of tasteful musicianship and confessional songwriting. Equally, collaborations with Shannon Van Etten and Fleet Foxes feel so predictable as to be redundant, even though they’re perfectly nice songs performed impeccably by very talented people. In all, ‘How Long Do You Think it’s Gonna Last’ ends up being less than the sum of its parts.

6/10

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Kanye West ‘Donda’ – Review

It’s hard to tell if the black void yawning back at me on Spotify is really ‘Donda’s intended album art or if it simply signifies the absence of an actual cover. Could it be something added by a record label that has finally released the album, after multiple delays, allegedly against Kanye West’s consent? Certainly, the cover is not the same as the one that leaked this time last year, nor is it the same as the one Kanye revealed online last month. It’s different again to the images that sprung up in and around his hometown of Chicago recently. It’s a messy, confusing situation, and in its way, it encapsulates everything that ‘Donda’ has become.

If the black album art IS Kanye’s design, then it’s an uncharacteristically tired one; afterall, identical covers have been done before, and sent up hilariously. The unoriginality is surprising from an artist who has innovated and pioneered more than anyone else in the 21st century – both in the medium of album art, and visual aesthetics generally, but also in his music. It reflects an album that is, as often as not, equally unremarkable. In many ways, ‘Donda’ is Kanye West’s first flat-out poor release. Of course being a Kanye album, there are moments of genius, and a couple of songs that feel almost transcendent, but this time those moments are not enough to save a record that gets suffocated by its own bloat. Kanye’s flirted with disaster before of course – that’s always been part of his high wire act – but this is the first time in his career that he has seemed so conceptually untethered, so artistically spent, so reliant on modes that feel predictable.

Across three listening parties, Kanye chopped and changed running orders, inserted and deleted beats, flew JAY Z out to record a verse hours before kick off, only to remove him by the time of the next listening party (in favour of disgraced homophobe Da Baby no less). Chronic impulsivity has been a characteristic of Kanye‘s work going back to ‘Yeezus’ but this is the first time it’s manifested itself so perniciously in the final product. There is no internal logic to the way that ‘Donda’ is sequenced or structured. It results in an exhausting experience for the listener.

27 tracks. One hour, 50 minutes. Beats only really prick the surface a handful of times throughout the running order. It gives the album a strange, almost ambient quality, amplified by the organ drones and choral harmonies. It’s as if time itself slows down. Unglued to a beat, and lost in a swell of sound, borders between tracks get smudged. For such a long album, too many of these songs hit similar marks. Particularly in the first half, it’s difficult to differentiate, say, ‘Off the Grid’, ‘Praise God’ and ‘Ok, Ok’. Even the countless guests start to feel interchangeable; the heavy hitters like Jay Z and The Weeknd sound bored out of their skulls, the younger rappers do nothing to particularly stand out in the way that Nicki Minaj did on the iconic ‘Monster’. Kanye still has that star making potential but neither he or his protégés take advantage here.

Donda’ is a jumble of old ideas, with Kanye leaning on sounds that have worked for him in the past. ‘Believe What I Say’ throws back to a ‘College Dropout’ sample. He brings out the ‘Flashing Lights’ synths on the undercooked ‘New Again’ (love that opening line though: ‘you better not hit me with a H-E-Y, it better be like Hiiiiiii with a bunch of i’s or Heyyyyyyy with a bunch of y’s’). The ‘Yeezus’ sub bass rumbles underneath ‘God Breathed’. Ultimately though ‘Donda’ hits differently. Literally it’s far more but really so much less. It might borrow ‘808s’ despondency but it lacks the tight focus and heartbroken vision. It mirrors ‘Life of Pablo’s ambitious sprawl but whereas ‘Pablo’s length connoted ambition and enthusiasm, ‘Donda’ just feels messy. Unedited. Repetitive. Yes, it’s long but it isn’t purposefully long. ‘Jesus is King’ was a breezy 28 minutes. The gospel choir and evangelical fervour glued Kanye’s verses together. ‘Ye’ was even more concise and thematically bound – in fact it ran for fewer minutes (23) than Donda has songs (27). 

Kanye was the first mainstream rapper to make vulnerability a suit of armour. He prioritised radical honesty over technical proficiency. He was the grounded producer’s producer in the pink sweater and backpack; the one who called out George Bush and MTV, who has, to a fault, expressed himself courageously both publicly and artistically ever since. There are some reminders here that the same integrity still bubbles in the depths of Kanye West. The album opens with his mother’s name being repeated like an incantation, and the album ostensibly draws inspiration from her life and death (just as ‘808s and Heartbreaks so viscerally did). She appears fleetingly to offer snippets of wisdom and reassurance, and in a sense these vocal clips do some heavy lifting in humanising her son, who has come to seem otherworldly in the years since her passing. On ‘Donda’, it’s as if he’s coming back down to Earth. Surrounded by collaborators, and minimising his own vocal contributions, Kanye is less prickly, less confrontational and less braggadocious when he does go to the mic. He’s toned down the evangelicalism of ‘Jesus is King’ but continues to explore the impact that God has on his life. It reminds me how, after a trilogy of explicitly spiritual albums, Bob Dylan more subtly integrated Christian imagery into his 1981 album ‘Shot of Love’, in a way that secular fans could appreciate. Similarly, Kanye has made a covertly religious album that may ultimately do more to move the hearts of the average listener than his more obviously devotional work.

‘Lord I Need You’ is a favourite of mine. Kanye’s rapping here is cool and clear minded. The production is sparse but the beat is a crisp anchor. It makes me wonder how much harder it would hit if it weren’t 20 tracks deep into a 27 track album.

‘Lord Jesus’ is the true highlight. In fact, it’s the best thing Kanye’s done since the knottier tracks on ‘Life of Pablo’, easily. He raps. Actually raps. Actually sounds like he’s having fun with internal rhymes and riding the beat. ‘If I talk to Christ, can I bring my mother back to life?/ And if I die tonight, will I see her in the afterlife?’ It’s heartbreaking. And Jay Electronica turns up with HIS best verse in a while as well. The fact they hold your attention for nearly ten minutes, an hour into a pretty dreary, ridiculously lengthy album, is quite incredible.

The album’s most revelatory moment comes on ‘Come to life’, an understated ballad that recalls ‘808s and Heartbreak’s’ sugar laced melancholy. ‘I don’t want to die alone,’ Kanye repeats sincerely, his vulnerability crunching against the robotic auto-tune that he returns to like a crutch. The song unwraps his bravado little by little – at one point he addresses his wife – ‘I get mad when she’s gone, I get made when she’s home…’ Right after a very typically Kanye joke about his daughter wanting Nikes, he makes a decisively un-Kanye like statement: ‘this is not about me’. THIS IS NOT ABOUT ME. For all the bluster, for all the bloat, ‘Donda’ truly cuts through with those five simple words. On an album named for his mother, largely about God’s grace, and defined, for better or worse, by his collaborations with others, this feels like a breakthrough. For all the mis-strides and disappointments there is the sense here that Kanye is truly – not rhetorically or performatively – letting the light in and stepping slightly out of the frame.

6/10

August Playlist

what I’ve been enjoying over the past few weeks