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Track Listings
| 1. Foxtrot |
| 2. Tango |
| 3. Shuffle |
| 4. Country |
| 5. Frostbite |
| 6. Fast 1 |
| 7. Slam |
| 8. Crucifixion |
| 9. Moonwalk |
| 10. Macabre Unit |
| 11. Buzz |
| 12. Mambo |
Product Description
Review
Normally, playing music like this restricts one to a scene committed to parity, low entry fees and avowed rejection of ‘corporate rock’ and the like. Flats, on the other hand, toured with Klaxons, The Horrors and Morrissey within a year of their formation in 2010, and were recently written about in at least one tabloid thanks to Devine being sent to Pentonville Prison for a drug rehab programme. (The hook for the story was Devine’s father Alan McGee’s public amusement at his son’s mishap; the vocalist has not only refuted accusations of industry leg-ups, but suggested the former Creation boss was less than a model dad.) It’s hard to figure who’s going to buy this album – card-carrying hardcore kids will likely deem it inauthentic; gentler indie sorts will merely hear a sloppy racket – but Flats probably relish getting on as many nerves as possible.
As it happens, they sound like they know their onions on Better Living’s 12 songs. Self-produced, presumably to ensure that the blown-out guitar and biscuit tin drums remain unpolished, it is sometimes slow and Eyehategod-ish (the opening Foxtrot and closing Mambo – over half the titles refer to dance styles, for reasons unexplained) and more often fast (a visceral midsection featuring the prosaically titled Fast, Slam and a cover of Crucifixion by proto-black metal teens Hellhammer). Devine’s oikish bawl sits somewhere between Cal from Discharge and Crass mouthpiece Steve Ignorant, and while it’s safe to say Flats don’t have a hope of making an irrevocable impact on punk like those two bands, they uphold their legacy to a greater degree than you might expect. Sonically speaking, at least.
--Paul Lester
Find more music at the BBC This link will take you off Amazon in a new window
Customer Reviews
The album begins with "Foxtrot:" one of BETTER LIVING's best cuts. It's doom-rock-inspired guitar riff carries the song into a great groove that never really lets up. The following track, "Tango," feels like a kick to the spine in comparison -- the song picks up the pace considerably over the gloomier "Foxtrot," and never lets up. "Frostbite" finds the band attempts to pull off the same grooves from the album's opening track, but it comes at diminished returns. The lo-fi "Slam" brings the band's sound to a more conventional center, and it pays off with one of the album's best tracks. The nihilistic power by the Flats never comes as close as the bands' predecessors, but some listeners will enjoy the raw aggression that the band puts on display here.
BETTER LIVING is by no means terrible, but by the end of its running time, it wears out its welcome. For people interested in this intersection between grunge and punk, I would recommend this year's THE PLOT AGAINST COMMON SENSE by The Future of the Left. Essential tracks to sample/download: "Foxtrot" and "Tango." If listeners enjoy the samples that are available on Amazon, I would recommend this album, but there are many other great punk records out there to check out before BETTER LIVING.
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