“Evolution will not be compromised” was the mantra under which Dubliners The Murder Capital recorded their second album “Gigi’s Recovery”. If they are smart, they will stick it on the T-shirt, but it really reflects the essence of the jump that the five made. The band’s 2019 debut album “When I Have Fears” was released when the Irish scene exploded along with other metropolitan noise artists Fontaines D.C., who released their first album, while Shame put things in order and IDLES created waves on their backs. breakthrough “Joy as an act of resistance”.
Frontman James McGovern recently told NME how the band’s “identity was formed early on around the idea of standing up to everything and seeing the friction it creates,” while never feeling “fully represented” by the scene around them. They will always be mentioned along with the aforementioned groups, but they deserve praise for having paved their own path and made a bold leap into the unknown here.
“It’s a strange feeling I’ve encountered, I can’t admit it—I’m losing my grip,” McGovern warns of the pensive and sad opening soundscape of “Existence,” before in the excruciating and drugged “Crying,” he asks, “Is this our way to escape? Our way through the gate we built? Is this our end?” From this moment the album begins a journey of introspection, introspection, discovery and recovery through a sonic adventure.
The most exciting experiments are presented in the form of the dark electro questioning mortality “Stars will leave their stage”, the kaleidoscopic middle part “Lies Become Themselves” and the impetuous song “A Thousand Lives”, owned by Radiohead. all the while, McGovern wonders if he will ever be “enough.” You can still find a searing punk edge in the cathartic “Get My Head Back,” and “Birthday Party” meets the gloominess of Iceage’s “Ethel,” but it adds to a more widescreen mood. The final sequence from “We Had To Disappear” to the final track “Exist” through “Only Good Things” and the title track complete the arc of self-discovery with increasing ease and a gentle final number that finds McGovern a bit of a hard-suffering world: “I’ll stay committed, I’ll make it stick. This morning I took upon myself the responsibility to stay in my own skin forever.”
The Murder Capital may have come with a shout and a fist, but now they are soaring with nuances, ideas, a big heart and the first great guitar album of 2023. Anger is energy, but love is power.
Details
- Release date: January 20
- Record label: Human Season
