Have THE STRANGLERS ever actually been young? While their 1977 punk contemporaries made much of the snotty energy of their youth, The Stranglers boasted a looming, surly drummer already the wrong side of that already-unthinkable 40 barrier, and in Hugh Cornwell possessed a frontman with the leering menace of the seediest Dickensian villain. In short, The Stranglers have always seemed old in their soul. Nearly four decades and some personnel reshuffling on, the band have grown (‘mellowed’ seems entirely the wrong word in the circumstances) into the world-weary cynicism that their early personas always suggested.
With three quarters of the original line-up still present and in fighting form, Giants is the band’s 17th album, and astonishingly can be counted among their best. In a more pleasing alternate universe you could place this album after, say, 1983’s Feline, avoiding the long years of soured inter-band chemistry that followed, and a more pleasing curve of evolution follows, culminating in this excellent collection of time-worn melancholia.
The opener, Another Camden Afternoon, is a bluesy instrumental which foregrounds JJ Burnel’s signature bass growl and Baz Warne’s excellent punky-blues guitar work. Next up, centrepiece track Freedom Is Insane drifts in with a melancholy tide of keyboards before revving up into a Raven-paced chug and Burnel’s careworn tale of loss and isolation. The lengthy instrumental middle section sees the band swapping solos, as they once did so effortlessly on their supreme cover of Walk On By.
The title track is a lugubrious grower, with Burnel’s exasperated narration bemoaning the shabby state of modern humanity - “once there were giants walking amongst us, now I have to deal with little men with little hearts”. Lofty sentiments, but ones backed up by the weight of their experience.
Aside from the accomplished songwriting, sharp production and their sheer dogged longevity, one of the impressive things about this album is how organic the whole thing feels - with Warne now wholly incorporated, Giants’ sprawling musical manifesto always feels natural rather than unfocused.
|
The wistful, jazzy My Fickle Resolve sees a return to Feline’s acoustic bass, with Warne’s languid spoken vocal wafted along by Jet Black’s brush work, and concluding with an exquisite Greenfield solo that evokes Herbie Hancock rather than the usual Ray Manzarek comparisons. For those holding out for the aggression of old, only Time Was Once on My Side delivers some nostalgic blunt force, a show of defiant energy that the black-belt Burnel takes by the scruff of the neck, while as an equally forceful reminder of their creative unpredictability, Adios offers the band’s first display of - yes - heavy metal tango, complete with Spanish lyrics.
For anyone still hankering after the uniquely skewed belligerence of the band’s late ’70’s imperial era, then perhaps the album may prove a disappointment. That band, those personas, have receded into the past and they’ll probably never be as musically crazed or personally dangerous again - which is how life is, and probably should be. If, however, you accept that musical idols grow old in the same manner as we mere listeners do, then Giants is almost the perfect crowning of a remarkable career.
The Stranglers official website
|
