This is one of those records. You can throw about as many influences as you like: The Pixies; Beefheart; Television; even , The Fire Engines if you were so inclined. But McLusky manage to take all this chomp it up and provide their own unique brand of...well...rock. And boy, this record rocks. Malevolent, angry and sweaty. Just the way it should be. And all this from the kids from the Rhonda Valley. (OK, I think one of them is Irish and they’re actually Cardiff based – so, shoot me.) And, it’s got Albini behind the desk making amends for a lot of his recent shocking behaviour.

This, their second, album opens with the glorious “Lightsaber Cocksucking Blues”. It’s fast, it’s loud, it’s shouty, and it’s possibly the best single of the millennium (ie. this one). They then serve up slab after slab of heavy bass driven grungy (in the best possible sense) music with a sharp take on lyrics and a snazzy way with a title. At the centre of the album things quieten down for the more contemplative “Fuck This Band”. Apparently ‘because they swear too much’ which is strangely hypnotic. Followed by another anthemic single (“To Hell With Good Intentions”). By which point if you’re not jumping up and down like a petulant ten year old wired on jelly beans, I’m sorry to let you know but, you’re dead.

But, unlike so many of their peers, they save the best for last. The closing four tracks on this album drive home and cement all that’s been going on previously. Opening with the joyous “The World Loves Us, And IS Our Bitch” a track that must have been written for the B-52’s. You wonder why they never chose to do it. The epic (by McLusky standards – ie over 2 minutes long) “Alan Is A Cowboy Killer” is the most Pixiesque track on here (despite having the least Black Francis style vocaling on it). I have no idea what it’s about, but it sounds very, very scary. Then on to “Gareth Brown Says”, a staccato riff that the Knack woulda been proud of. And an opening salvo to beat all others:
‘All of your friends are cunts
Your mother is a ball point pen thief
Michael Caine doesn’t follow you round
And, you’ve never been to Alton Towers’
Nuff said, methinks.

The album closes with “WhoYouKnow”. A good time boogie-woogie number a la NY Dolls. A dark paeon to someone who’s ‘heart’s turned the colour of Coca-Cola’ or, indeed, a dust……bin.

Go on, I dare you. Suck it and see. But, as the McLusky lads’ll warn you:
‘Don’t go fucking in the barn, because the barns on fire’
No, me neither.

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