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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk
The fourth, self-titled album by New York’s Liars finds them back on the map after two albums, 2004’s They Were Wrong, So We Drowned and 2006’s Drum’s Not Dead, that saw the band journey deep into the experimental wilderness. It’s important to understand, though, that in the world of Liars, weirdness is relative. So while Liars might be lyrics on songs about witches and twilit percussion experiments, these eleven tracks of spooked, discord-heavy rock, clanking grooves and skronky garage crunch suggest this band still have little to no interest in pandering to the mainstream. Primarily, it’s a shift in energy: on the rockiest track here, "Cycle Time", they marshall white-hot guitar riffs and caterwauling vocals in a way that recalls The Rapture’s pre-disco masterpiece Out of the Races and onto the Tracks; "Freak Out", meanwhile, could almost be a lost track from the Jesus and Mary Chain’s Psychocandy sessions, with 60s psychedelia tearing along in a dust cloud of feedback. If there’s a problem here, however, it’s the presumably intentional underproduction, which leaves tracks like "What Would They Know" sounding tinny and cheap. A shame, because elsewhere, Liars sees this band forging bravely onward. --Louis Pattison
Review
Refusing to be pigeon-holed for longer than you could hold a pigeon, Liars' fourth album follows last year's Drum's Not Dead with what seems like unseemly haste for the most quixotic, engaging and not a little intimidating three-piece between here and wherever you are.
Masters of metamorphosis, the eponymously titled new offering reveals yet another abrupt change of direction. Concept-free and drenched in noise, the result surprises with its easy, confidently handled reliance on traditional song structures and its unabashed use of solos. 'If you told me last year I'd be playing guitar solos', frontman Angus Hamilton declares in the accompanying press release, 'I'd have called you a liar'. All right, Angus, calm down mate, guitar solos need love, too, you know!
More immediately noticeable is the uncluttered honesty and directness on display. The album's first single, 'Plaster Casts Of Everything', provides a raucous tantrum of an introduction to an 11-strong set that positively froths at the mouth with ideas and imagination.
Solace of sorts, found in the sulk-saturated 'Houseclouds', is soon surrendered to the creepy cavernous, pitch-black incantations of 'Leather Prowler'. But just as the fear needle edges into red, along comes the blissfully semi-detached 'Sailing Into Byzantium', all whispery and fuzzy and reassuringly free from sharp edges.
The drunkenly blurred demeanour of the Jesus & Mary Chain-like 'Pure Unevil' comes courtesy of a dizzying cocktail of feedback and reverb that achieves a more vivid echo in the likeably sprawling 'Dumb in the Rain'. Closing track 'Protection' is bittersweet nostalgia shot through with late-period prog-rock atmospherics and a sweetly maudlin finale to another vivid aural assault from a trio who keep you guessing about the how and the why of it all from start to finish. --Michael Quinn
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
... this is the Liars most accessible album since 'Monument'. 'Drowned' and 'Drum' were way out on the experimental scale, but were refreshing in the sense that this was a band who really didn't give a **** about the commercial side of the music business. They were making 'noise' to suit themselves and if anyone else happened to like it then fair enough. Thats what makes them interesting, although sometimes hard to listen to.
'Liars' is about as conventional as this band are likely to get. The album even has proper songs, with strong references to Garage Rock, Punk Funk and the Jesus and Mary Chain in particular.
I love it. I love the fact that this band are making music for themselves instead of pandering to the industry.
It's not for everyones tastes thats for sure, but if you have an open mind about your music I'm certain that you'll find much of interest on 'Liars'.
'Liars' is about as conventional as this band are likely to get. The album even has proper songs, with strong references to Garage Rock, Punk Funk and the Jesus and Mary Chain in particular.
I love it. I love the fact that this band are making music for themselves instead of pandering to the industry.
It's not for everyones tastes thats for sure, but if you have an open mind about your music I'm certain that you'll find much of interest on 'Liars'.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
sometimes you really need to counter the hopeless idiocy of some people. This album is far from the tuneless dirge attested to by a previous reviewer, in fact it is full of relatively straightforward garage rock encassed within Western song structures of around 3 to 4 minutes in length, but complete with the sense of power and menace one associates with Liars output. This record is for anyone with an interest in music which demands proper listening and gives no quarter (see my pun Zeppelin boy) touching on not just garage, but krautrock, fuzz, noise and ambience. My advice to anyone is to start at the start with They Threw Us In A Trench... and work through the fantastic back catalogue of Liars always involving experiments in music, from the funk-punk Mr Your On Fire Mr to the understated rhythmic beauty of The Other Side Of Mt. Heart Attack. Most wholeheartedly recommended for fans of Deerhunter, No Age and Aninmal Collective, but maybe not those who think that Smoke On The Water is God's gift to man.
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