Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Change is inevitable, to hold on to the once stated as if it was written in stone, a mantra that ties the future and the past together like conjoined twins pulling against each other’s wishes in a symbiotic tug of war, that way lays insanity, it is to deny freedom of expression, it is to stand in the way of progress.
Change happens, either through necessity or because of Time insisting that the outlook must take a direction if we are to continue to be relevant, to understand this is to accept that it is a continual cycle of renewal, if you confront it, if you wish to see your work turn to dust, then nobody has the right to stop you from becoming a relic of your own industry.
It is to this end that Birmingham favourites The Twang step up to the front of the argument with their new album, If Confronted Just Go Mad. To the unsolicited ear it may feel as if the album has shifted in its position, like rearranging the deck chair on the beach to avoid the glare of the sun in your eyes when you have forgotten to wear shades; however, it is more in keeping to believe that the deck chair has been packed away, sold off at a car boot sale and the owner realising that there is beach in another country where the seat is lot more comfortable and the view has a picturesque appeal for the eyes.
The emotion of the band is still there, the social commentary still weaves itself through the undercurrent of the music, but the new sound shies away from the menace of the past and instead embraces a new found optimism, found directly in the style of the female vocals that inhabit, that grace the new recording.
We all have been knocked down, but it is how you respond to the action that sets you on the next stage of your life, but as tracks such as Lovin State, It Feels Like (You’re Wasting My Time), Time Waits, Izal and Tinseltown In The Rain all force themselves with care and attention on the listener, the response that comes fighting through should be, if I get knocked down, then I stand again, never let them show you are hurting. As the album alludes too, if confronted then show them how great, how impossibly beautiful you can be.
A decent album full of confidence and cheer but retaining the drive that first saw the band emerge as one of the bright spots of the new millennium of Birmingham music.
The Twang will release If Confronted Just Go Mad on the 8th November.
Ian D. Hall