…and we’re back!
Future Of The Left, the maniacal four-piece, return with their fifth studio album albeit their first in nearly three years, and once more the world is restored to its axis. In the same way every Harry Potter book/film was born into the world to a universal fanfare of appreciation, so FOTL create a similar sense of impending excitement. Naturally, that’s where the similarities come to an abrupt and resounding dead end, for Head Boy Andy Falkous is no bespectacled wizard, he’s just a very naughty boy.
I first encountered FOTL some 8 years ago now, whilst pressed up against the crash barriers at the front of a gig. Three songs in and I was at the very back, their intensity, their unhinged facial expressions and my very real concern for my own well-being had me enthralled and terrified in equal measure. Later that year I exited the Rocky Mountains with their album Curses still ringing in my ears. Trust me, the picturesque and tranquil emptiness of Canada does not lend itself to the incendiary and claustrophobic nature of FOTL.
But what of The Peace and Truce Of Future Of The Left? Have they mellowed? Has their sound and ethos progressed onto a new sonic plane? Well, no. Of course it hasn’t. FOTL remain les enfants terrible of the modern musical world, refusing to follow industry rules and ploughing their own unique furrow. TPATOFOTL was Kickstarter funded in a shade over three hours which tells you an awful lot about the affection and disposable income of their followers.
Personally, I have always been drawn to bands with a strong lyrical content to their work, my youth was spent pouring over record sleeves in a vain attempt to decipher hidden meanings. The overarching appeal of FOTL is not to be found in the instrumentation but the clever wordsmithery of Falkous who has a laser-guided ability to subvert the English language into something unsettling yet witty. He is the Ronnie Barker of his musical generation.
TPATOFOTL follows the same lyrical direction as previous albums although their is less obvious anger in the delivery. Let me be honest here, I’m not about to offer any sixth form analysis into their meaning, partially because I do not have the intelligence to second guess the inner workings of the Falkous’ mind and secondly because he would probably dismember me. For example, on the opener ‘If A&T drank tea what would BP do‘ a becalmed Falkous muses “the gammon on the bed was fine Danny” and that’s just for starters. During ‘In A Former Life’ we are advised that “crop rotation does not really work” which as a former farm boy I agree with wholeheartedly and I doubt very much whether ‘Running All Over The Wicket’ is a tale about inadequate umpiring.
‘Miner’s Gruel’ is splendidly unsettling, ‘The Limits of Battleships’ a nursery rhyme for a disengaged generation and ‘Back When I Was Brilliant’ just a bleak howl at the moon. If you haven’t embraced FOTL previously, then now is your opportunity. One look at the album cover tells you more than my review ever will, FOTL are once again laying waste to all before them and it’s a gorgeous, balletic cacophony.
The Peace And Truce Of Future Of The Left is released on April 8th 2016 on Prescription Records
