Stereophonics: Pull the Pin
Stereophonics release their seventh album
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Saturday, 13, Oct 2007 05:20
V2, out October 15th.
In a nutshell...
Rocky, versatile, guitar-full, rhythmic, lyrcial
What's it all about?
Pull the Pin is a collection of 12 songs that display everything that is good and great about a band that crashed into the popular music consciousness a decade ago. There's a place on the album for the variety of styles that have served the band well over the decade, with the pure rock guitars of summer taster track Bank Holiday Monday to the much more poetic and heartfelt Daisy Lane. You can pick any song from the new album and imagine it sitting comfortably on any of the band's former collections. A number of songs seem to hark back to songs on other albums - parts of Crush owe a debt to More Life In a Tramp's Vest for example - but in general the songs seem richer, telling stories, or screaming about the life of the Welsh duo and their relatively-new Argentine cohort.
Who's it by?
Stereophonics are frontman Kelly Jones, the unrelated bassist Richard Jones and Javier Weyler. Weyler is the newest to the setup, having joined following the departure of Stuart Cable. It is Weyler's second studio album with the band, the Stereophonics' seventh in total (Live from Dakota their only non-studio effort). They have had four number one albums and were one of the first bands to be signed to Richard Branson's V2 label back in 1996. After a period following their last album Language.Sex.Violence.Other? that saw both Kelly Jones and Weyler release solo projects, the band are back with Pull the Pin.
As an example.
"Woke up with the shakes on the bathroom floor/The sun is shining, I felt like drinking some more/Sunday's takeaway welded on my Elvis tray/It's a pound a can in the garden all day" - Bank Holiday Monday
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
The critics could very well love Pull the Pin. It certainly has enough quality to be one of the albums of the year and see Jones et al grab a number one album spot. As for a Grammy, it's unlikely. The highest the 'Phonics have ever been in the US album charts was number 11 with Just Enough Education to Perform.
What the others say
"Pull The Pin showcases the Welsh/Argentinean band's ability to utilise a variety of styles taken from their decade long career to create something that can stand alongside any of their previous triumphs." - Gigwise
"Surprise surprise, another dour helping of granddad rock from trying-to-look-young Welsh upstarts. This is their worst effort to date and it is a million miles away from the days of Word Gets Around." - forum poster on AlbumVote.co.uk
So is it any good?
On first listen Pull the Pin seemed average at best. I think it was an unfortunate choice to go for It Means Nothing as the first single of the new album, as the sound of Pull the Pin is more rocky than that, more intense and more late 1990s Stereophonics. Gone for the most part are the 'experimental' songs of You Gotta Go There To Come Back and back in number are the harsher - yet richer - sounds from the earlier albums.
While Pull the Pin is no Word Gets Around and no Performance and Cocktails, it knocks Just Enough Education to Perform and You Gotta Go There To Come Back out of the park. Javier Weyler is well and truly integrated into the sound and the obvious presence of a harder, rockier sound is testament to this. The sound that semi-threatened to return in tracks such as Doorman and Deadhead on Language.Sex.Violence.Other? seems to have found a home, while the more melodic quality heard in former number one single Dakota rears its head in songs such as Pass the Buck.
Pull the Pin is a very good album, pulling together the sounds that have made the band an enduring success. It is a good bet to think this will find itself to the number one spot in the album chart before too long. On the second - and subsequent - listens, it keeps getting better.
8 /10
Chris Webber
"Brilliant album - there is no stopping them... Ace" - Gareth Pierce