There aren’t many things in this world that are more infectious than Less than Jake – in fact, only yo-yos and a daphne and celeste hit spring to mind. Anyway, here they are again, with ‘Borders and boundaries’, which will almost certainly annoy and delight in equal amounts.
Things start of at relatively fast pace with ‘Magnetic north’ taking on a very ‘losing streak’ sound, albeit you’ll start to realise that the tracks are longer in length than some of their earlier efforts, yet the vocals still have that distinctive sound with some definite sing-a-long lyrics.
About the time ‘Kehoe’ fires up you’re beginning to wonder whether Less than Jake have gone the way of the buffalo and slowed down. Well, the answer is yes, they have slowed down considerably, and put a lot more effort into their songwriting; whether this is a good thing or not is a matter of personal preference. I can’t listen to the start of ‘Kehoe’, it grates too much; the song doesn’t transform itself, and remains a crawling ska tune with that same annoying riff throughout. No brownie points here.
‘Suburban myth’ could slip by you if you weren’t paying attention, but give it a few listens and it’ll soon grow on you, if only because of the claps at the end of the track. It is the fourth track, ‘Look what happened’, which shows a mellower, more relaxed LTJ, and has an excellent melody and lyrics which will stick in your head all day (a good thing, especially during bored periods at work). ‘Hell looks a lot like L.A’ thankfully pushes the whole outfit up a gear , but isn’t anything special.
The real treat of this album is around half way through – ‘Gainesville rock city‘ is without a doubt one of my favourite LTJ tracks ever; it’s got it all, a superb riff, lyrics that you actually listen to instead of being just part of the song, and a brilliant change of tempo around two and a half minutes in, changing to a bounding shout-at-the-top-of-your-voice song then back again to finish fast and furiously. Followed by this comes the equally good ‘Malt liquor tastes better when you’ve got problems’, jam packed with anthem choruses.
‘Is this thing on’ slows everything right down just as you thought the album was getting going; but that doesn’t mean that this isn’t an amazing song, because it is. I’m pretty sure everyone feels like this at some point, and LTJ have managed to capture it perfectly. ‘Last hour of the last day of work’ is also a slow masterpiece, with more time to reflect in time for ‘faction’, as LTJ go out in style.
All in all a good album, its just a pity there are, in my opinion, a few duds. Its not losing streak, its not even rockview, but it is different and is a damn good album. Invest.
(where’s mr Reynolds anyway?)
nick