Is this a roaring success or more like a…(brace yourself)…velociCRAPtor than anything else?
There’s no doubt that after 2009’s immensely successful mouthful of an album ‘West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum’, Kasabian find themselves sitting comfortably in the top drawer of modern British rock music. On fire, if you will. Over 1 million copies sold worldwide tells the story. No Oasis comparison can take that away from them. Admittedly, there’s not too much in the way of competition for this particular perch, but nonetheless they’ve made the big time; in my opinion sitting next to Muse and Arctic Monkeys as the best/biggest 3 bands our little island has to offer the world. Not too shabby, eh? With ‘Velociraptor!’ (yes, they have indeed punctuated the album title with an exclamation mark – it really is
that exciting), Sergio Pizzorno claims to have written rock music’s first true classic record in 16 or so years. An outrageous claim it certainly is; one that you’d be more inclined to think had come from the gob of a Gallagher. Musically though, they’re a continuation of the lad rock style. Kasabian are more adventurous and eclectic and tone down the downsides of Oasis. Tom Meighan, the lead singer, for example, is only a
bit of a twat, whereas both of the Gallagher brothers are
massive twats. Pizzorno also proudly boasted the Leicester based band’s 4th effort to be a ‘jukebox’ album; one where every song is a true hit. He famously reported that the songwriting process for ‘Velociraptor!’ was quicker than that of any they’ve experienced before, and he put this mostly down to some form of divine/spiritual intervention. Fair play… Kasabian have a lot to live up to, yet also a lot of room to grow into. This prehistoric beast can roar the roar, but can ‘Velociraptor!’ walk the walk?
After the opening track, I still don’t have enough evidence as to whether or not their walking skills are up to scratch, but one thing’s for sure, Kasabian can swagger. Can they Swagger Jagger though? I hope not. Let’s Roll Just Like We Used To kicks the album off with a gong (something which is sorely underused in music in general right now), and flows with a flamenco feel. There’s a tinge of The Last Shadow Puppets to this one. It’s a pretty neat song, and while it’s nothing like the in-your-face Club Foot or the punchy Underdog or even the stompy Empire, for that matter, it’s a fine way to begin the trip. MORE GONGS, PLEASE.
7/10
Second on the tracklist is the lead single, Days Are Forgotten. The riff is dirty, the beat is flirty, and the vocals are…running out of words to rhyme, it seems. Nah, the vocals are mostly pretty good on this song, but like the rest the album, it can sound a bit droning and one-dimensional at times. Every component of this song comes together to form a good, solid single, but in truth it’s just not anywhere near as memorable as Fire was from the previous record. It seems that every human on the Earth liked that song, and with good reason. There’s a fair chance that this single will soon be forgotten along with days mentioned in the song’s almost powerful chorus (in terms of sustained chart impact), though it would be a harsh outcome. The best thing about this song, and indeed the album on the whole is the production work from Dan the Automator. He makes this song badass, to put it bluntly, and it’s got an atmosphere to it that I find exceedingly difficult to describe. It’s oddly moreish once you begin to notice the subtleties to the mixing, especially the steadily but dramatically stepping up background pitch in the build-up to the chorus. It’s a really effective tool and it means that as a listener, you know exactly when the chorus is coming in, and crucially; when you can sing along again. Great, but not as good as what we’ve come to expect from Kasabian.
8/10
What have we here? It’s Goodbye Kiss, and it’s a bit of a ballad; perhaps even the first proper ballad we’ve heard from the band. A traditional sounding tune, that’s not quite perfectly suited to Tom Meighan’s brash, wavering voice. It’s actually really pleasant though, and Sergio Pizzorno’s backing vocals continue to compliment the vocals at the forefront. It’s a mature ballad from a band clearly trying to ease themselves away from the lads’ rock label that they’d stuck to themselves earlier in their career. I might have to question the placement of this track, as it may have benefited from closing the album in 11th position, but in the slot it’s been allotted it enables ‘Velociraptor!’ to smoothly impress. A real grower, and perhaps an early standout. Always a fan of the strings, too. Nostalgic.
8/10
Remember a band called The Beatles? Do you? No? Oh, never mind. La Feé Verte starts with a chilling, eerie breeze, before plodding in and making no effort to hide its influences by referencing Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds within its first few seconds of lyrics. The subject matter is bizarre throughout, but the song itself is unfortunately rather pedestrian. Serge decides to take the lead on this song, vocally, and I’d probably agree with the fact that it suits his frail voice better than it does Meighan’s, whose voice you can also hear during this fourth track at select moments. When I first heard this track, it was actually one of my favourites from the album but this opinion didn’t last for very long. The more you listen to this song, the more unremarkable it gets, and the more tempted you are to oblige with Pizzorno’s pleas and send him ‘down the river’. It’s a bit of a shame really, because the instrumental intro and outro are both tantalisingly dark, yet it never fully translates into the main song.
6/10
Velociraptor!, the title track is up next, and it doesn’t let up. It’s silly;
very silly, satisfyingly so - with some more absurd vocals and the introduction of grimier guitars to boot. This is the most Kasabian-esque Kasabian have sounded so far on the album, and it’s a super-fun little song while it lasts. The tinny drum fills are a little bit cheap, but on the other hand, they lend themselves to the hectic style of the song perfectly. They actually sound quite crisp and clean. One thing’s for sure, plenty of people will be singing and punching along to this song when it’s performed live at next year’s festivals and on tour. It’s a relief to be reassured that Kasabian haven’t lost all of their loutish appeal, and so it’s good news to find this out relatively early on in the album.
8/10
Clang. It’s Acid Turkish Bath (Shelter From The Storm), a song that’s got to be right up there with the very worst titles of all time. What the
hell were they thinking? After only a small amount of aforementioned ‘clang’ we are greeted with some epic strings, and a just as epic drum beat. Barely 30 seconds in, this sounds very promising indeed. It doesn’t quite go the way you expect it to, swinging in with continental flair and Sergio Pizzorno back on lead vocals again. A little bit like Take Aim from West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum, without the awesomely bombastic chorus. It continues the trend of being a little bit psychedelic, and it incorporates a tiny bit of everything; electronic buzz, dramatic middle-Eastern strings, clapping, plentiful percussion and some more of that flamenco flavouring we tasted in Let’s Roll Just Like We Used To. It’s a tad disjointed when it comes to the awkwardly weak handclapping coda in which they unconvincingly tell us they’ve “got to break down the walls”, but the brief yet brilliant instrumental sections where the Lawrence of Arabia strings combine with the thumping beat ensure that the song doesn’t slip into mediocrity. 7
/10
I really,
really like this song’s scampering, electronica base. I don’t mean bass as in bass guitar, I mean base as in the base of a cake – the foundation of the song. Mmm, cake. I Hear Voices isn’t anything special, but it’s a bit of a surprise hit. By this I don’t mean that it’s unsuspectingly suitable to be a radio single, no no, but it’s perhaps the least talked about track from the album from the research I’ve gathered from the interwebs. I’m really glad that Kasabian haven’t left their electronic roots behind, because it adds an invaluable extra layer to their sound that many bands simply don’t have. I feel as though it needs to be said again though, because I Hear Voices just doesn’t do much at all for me, and I think I know why. Tom Meighan just doesn’t fit totally the bill, and nearly ruins a potentially better song. He’s not versatile enough to give the song the swerving ‘80s groove that it so clearly requires. It finishes rather swiftly too, and I dare say I’d be calling it obvious filler had there not been such a cool, retro sounding element present. I’m a bit of a sucker for small things like that really… *insert penis joke here* As it stands though, I
do enjoy this song a lot.
7/10
Re-wired is cool. It’s damn cool. Really damn cool. If I were in the business of making predictions, which I’m not by the way, I’d say that this is the most likely contender to be the second single from ‘Velociraptor!’. Like the title track, it sounds like classic Kasabian and knowing that, it’s just as bold and brash as you’d expect it to be. It’s a tiny bit ‘70s disco, with the swirling synths and the funky bass – it just oozes confidence and control, because it’s an assured delivery of a concept that could have been well overdone. I also swear that you can actually hear the guitar coughing a couple of times during this track, but
maybe I’m wrong. This is certainly one of the highlights of the album.
8/10
Man Of Simple Pleasures. Oasis. Yawn.
5/10
Next up is the first song the world was able to listen to from ‘Velociraptor!’. It wasn’t a single, but was offered as a free download to anybody who pre-ordered the album from Kasabian’s official website. Thanks, guys. For me, Switchblade Smiles is grossly ambiguous. It’s a patchwork, a mishmash, a mixing pot, a pile, a heap, a randomly assembled congregation of ideas and noises that can be taken one of two ways. I’m still not so sure as to how I should interpret it. The introduction is wobbly, but once it finds its feet it’s got a real ace up its sleeve. The grumbling, moaning electronic meat of the song is paired up with some surreal animal-instinct wailing, and then whammy, off we go, the drums kick in. This drum beat is fucking sick, there’s no two ways about it. You can forget about structure though, because Switchblade ‘Scaffolding’ this is not. It’s Switchblade
Smiles, and it’s all about having a hell of a lot of fun with a rough around the edges experimental romp. My dilemma of interpretation comes in the form of this: is it an ear-raping mess that a group of musically questionable teenagers could have written, entered into a talent contest, failed to win with, but would have been misguidedly immensely proud of? Or is it in fact an abstract work of genius, stripping away the complexities of music and focusing on what makes Kasabian’s target audience tick? I just don’t know…
7/10
Here we are. The end. Neon Noon will drag you through space by the neck of an acoustic guitar. Yet again Serge sings lead, and yet again it’s probably a good decision. Neither Serge nor Tom are great vocalists by any stretch of the imagination, but for Kasabian in truth it’s all about the styles and the tone of voice they come out with, rather than their melodic proficiency. As it so happens, this one’s very good on a melodic level though. What initially comes across as nifty but nothing more becomes a relaxing ride, reflecting on the eclectic and at times mental journey you’ve found yourself being dragged on. I really can’t get enough of this song. This is electro-pop-rock at its finest, and it does a fantastic job of closing the record. This is probably the first time Kasabian have ‘done’ loveliness, and it works wonders. The parping synths are brilliantly effective. They saved the best ‘til last, the cheeky buggers.
9/10
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| Serge looking cool. Tom looking...like Tom. |
Is this Kasabian’s best record to date? Probably not, no. It lacks a
big, hard hitting tune or two for the radio and commercial world to remember, but to counter this it seems to be a little more consistent than their previous efforts. Stylistically it’s not so different from West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum. Then again, it also bears similarities to Empire and their eponymous debut album. Fundamentally though, this is a step forward, away from what the public may have expected from the Leicester lot. By no means is this radical, though. The sounds that play with your ears are by and large very familiar, but they’re often just used in new, different ways in conjunction with brand new styles. It’s a varied collection of songs, and this will hopefully keep it fresh and listenable for a good long while. The third album was frequently thought of as an old-school movie soundtrack of sorts. This fourth album is is more like a drug-infused tour of the globe. It’s soft, it’s hard, it’s light, it’s dark – it’s ‘Velociraptor'!’, and though it’s far from the stone cold classic that Sergio Pizzorno foolishly indicated it would be, it’s an enjoyable album from start to finish that’s worthy of your time and money.
7/10
