White lines, wine, and a wild imagination are all you need to spend a weekend wallowing with Greg Gonzalez. On the band’s third album ‘X’s’, the Cigarettes After Sex frontman chases that heady mix with a deep dive into a toxic relationship. On paper, it sounds perfect. On record, it's a deadening 40-minute slide through 10 songs that are all indistinguishable from one another.
With the exception of Holding You, Holding Me’s GCSE English attempt at poetry, this is an album where music takes a backseat to storytelling. Gonzalez waxes lyrical on the details of the couple’s coming together and falling apart — from rose-coloured memories like indulging in cake after sex to depressive episodes, affairs and drug abuse.
There is also an interesting thematic thread where Gonzalez fixes his gaze upon fragments of his youth — the awakening sparked by seeing the Marvel character Silver Sable in a swimsuit as a kid, or comparing his lover’s shorts to Madonna’s in the Holiday video. It’s cinematic, it’s compelling, and it’s everything ‘X’s’ isn’t musically.
The title track is an anti-climatic whimper of an opener that fumbles the dynamism of the relationship at the heart of ‘X’s’, while Tejano Blue doesn’t do much better in its attempt to marry the infectious melodies of Selena with the Cocteau Twins’ ethereal dream-pop. Also in a limp opening stanza, Hideaway’s faint heartbeat only briefly threatens to thump into life, while Holding You, Holding Me glues its hands together with echoing riffs and rhythmic drumming.
Things do marginally improve as ‘X’s’ rolls on. Baby Blue Movie’s pendulum swings softly between melancholic Americana and psychedelic-pop grooves a la Tame Impala, while Dreams From Bunker’s Hill’s glimmering riffs ripple like rocks skimming across a gentle lake. There’s probably a decent EP in here.
But while Cigarettes After Sex’s stock continues to rise, creating a cult aura around the trio as they take each step forward, ‘X’s’ ultimately feels like two steps back as they stick to their guns and end up playing it way too safe.
Cigarettes After Sex Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows:
Tue November 12 2024 - LONDON O2 Arena
Wed November 13 2024 - LONDON O2 Arena
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