“We were a moving train – we just pressed pause.” These
words, spoken by Sleater-Kinney’s guitarist and singer Carrie Brownstein a few
days ago in an interview with Billboard, are at the root of what makes No Cities to Love such a great album. Brownstein
would go on to add, “it’s not a reunion – it’s a continuation.” The message
that this is not a nostalgia trip or a cash-grab comeback could not be clearer,
and if the band member’s insistence on this fact isn’t enough for you, then you
only have to listen to No Cities to Love
to realise that it is the long awaited eighth Sleater-Kinney album, and the
follow-up to 2005’s critically acclaimed The
Woods.
Written over the past two years, Corin Tucker, Carrie
Brownstein and Janet Weiss recorded the album in San Francisco, Seattle and
Portland with long-time collaborator and producer John Goodmanson. They
approached the album with manic meticulousness, determined to produce something
that could stand up with the rest of their output. In an e-mail to NPR
announcing the band’s return, Brownstein wrote that “[they] didn’t want to take
any […] song for granted, everything had to have an intention and earn its
place.” The end result is a blistering, high-tempo album that just stretches
over the half-hour mark without ever slowing down.
From the take down of twenty first century consumerism in
opening track Price Tag to
meditations on death, identity and love, the lyrics are as whip-smart as ever
and delivered by Tucker’s powerful howl and Brownstein’s snarl. Both Price Tag and Fangless set themselves up as catchy, polished indie-rock songs,
but there’s always something simmering beneath the surface that bubbles up as
the songs progress. By the time you’re singing along with the chorus for Price Tag there’s the anger and
frustration that underpinned much of Sleater-Kinney’s earlier politicised
output, updated for the post-recession riot grrrl. Brownstein’s scintillating
guitar lines bristle throughout, the perfect accompaniment to Tucker’s powerful
bluesy vocals on tracks like Surface Envy
where they announce something of a mission statement; “We win, we lose, only
together do we break the rules / We win, we lose, only together do we make the
rules” – it’s a powerful, fist-in-the air chorus, something the album isn’t
short on. By the time the second chorus rolls around on No Cities to Love you won’t only be singing along, you’ll be
incorporating the melody into your consciousness where it’ll stay for weeks.
And OH THE HOOKS AND BRIDGES AND CHORUSES in A New Wave, good God! Janet’s drum fills
are just a thing of beauty, a fitting ballast point as the song breaks down
before being pulled back in. You’ll know the bit I mean, but it’s around the
2.11 mark before it comes back to “no-one here is taking notice / No outline
will ever hold us / It’s not a new wave, it’s just you and me.” Then there’s
Corin going full-Corin on Gimme Love,
a song that alternates between spit, snarl and soul with some of the crunch of The Woods, the sparseness of The Hot Rock and the ‘je ne sais quoi’
of No Cities to Love. Then there’s Bury Our Friends, the track that
heralded the band’s continuation, which stomps in with one of the best choruses
on the album, “Exhume our idols and bury our friends / We’re wild and weary but
we won’t give in” before it ends all too abruptly. This is the only negative
thing I have to say about the album. By the time Corin closes the prog-tinged Fade with “oh what a price that we paid,
my dearest nightmare, a conscience, the end” it all feels too brief.
Yet, in keeping it brief they achieve their mission
statement. Everything here has earned its place. There’s no fat to trim. No Cities to Love is a triumph. I always
wondered where Sleater-Kinney could go after an album like The Woods, and here, a decade later, they’ve given us the only
answer.
No
Cities to Love by Sleater-Kinney is out on Monday 19th
January via Sub Pop.
LD
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