A first LP in five years by the likeable and solid guitar indie-rock Jarman brothers trio from Wakefield, now with their ninth - a catchy, but at times with rueful, bittersweet perspectives on their times in the music business. With fans and collaborators including Edwyn Collins, Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo, Johnny Marr, who briefly joined and whose guitar playing has left a clear influence, and and the late producer/engineer Steve Albini they’ve had a strong, enduring career slightly away from the biggest spotlight. Perhaps why they are survivors of a noughties indie guitar scene. From opener Dark Luck, there’s that distinctive, tight, fuzz guitar sound, catchy riffs and clean, singalong vocals, again delivering something, if not new, but certainly to please their fanbase. A certain difference though - there’s less joie de vivre than their past, coloured by later legal battle for the rights to their first five albums, and cited in the songs such as You’ll Tell Me Anything. Meanwhile, with innocence lost, “the good times never last” we hear on Looking for the Wrong Guy, a reflection on “the folly of youth” and how “ain’t it a shame tomorrow finally came?” On the title track: “Now you keep your pearls of wisdom / On a string of bad decisions/ But never fail to find / Excuses for the things you like.” Summer Seizures also has some of the many double-edges in evidence: “As the decade ends / And the night begins / The scars of romance / Look good in the mirror but they / Will echo through the years…/ Reflecting all your hopes and fears.” Or with regrets about the unsaid on A Point Too Hard to Make: “Fell on your sword / In the rush to be bored / I of course realise that it was my mistake? But the point was just too hard to make.” Nevertheless, there’s an admirable fortitude in how they endure, still unbowed by the ups and downs of the industry, as shown on the shimmering guitars and unison singing on final track Brothers Won’t Break: “Though we always understood / That all that our roots did / Was just trip us up / But we’ll keep it from an honest place / And the brothers won’t ever break? After all this time, you wonder why?” Out on Sonic Blew / PIAS.
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