Photo: Charles Jeffrey – LOVERBOY and Bunny Kinney
Ask The Horrors, “What genre are you again?”, and expect the answer, “All of them.” After ticking off landfill indie, krautrock, garage-punk and dream-pop like destinations on a bucket list, they have now returned with the promise of the “nastiest” music they’ve made since 2007’s debut ‘Strange House’. They’re not wrong: ‘Lout’ is nasty enough to have been fished out of a sewer, in good ways and bad.
For both newcomers to the band and to seasoned fans, the opening title track will be a head-scratcher. The gritty, almost vampiric industrial punk sound they’re trying on for size packs a moshpit-baiting battle cry of a chorus and some satisfyingly meaty riffs, but something about vocalist Faris Badwan’s delivery in the verses feels a little forced.
There is a lingering sense that he is trying very hard to play the role of the gothic industrial frontman, but all that effort feels unnatural.
Org, meanwhile, is as bizarre as its title, and a complete outlier within the context of the EP. Eschewing any rock sensibilities altogether, its atonal, glitchy UK garage sound feels like something The Prodigy might have made while they were hungover. Ultimately, it is little more than a confusing, synthesised mess.
The sultry, darkly theatrical Whiplash arrives just in time to save the EP. It offers the most refined, confident slice of chaotic industrial punk here, and would have been far more deserving of the B-side on the band’s limited 7” ‘Lout’ single than its predecessor.
The Horrors had it within them to make this experiment work. That potential shines through on Whiplash in particular but, ultimately, their lack of focus and some overwrought moments render this an uneven and occasionally frustrating listen.
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