The Wombats - Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life (Album Review)

11 years ago, Liverpudlian indie rockers The Wombats hit us with their fiery, energetic debut that included the huge singles 'Let's Dance To Joy Division', 'Moving To New York' and 'Kill The Director'. That was 2007. On February 9th 2018 they released their 4th studio album titled 'Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life'...

The Wombats have always been an enthusiastic band but on this latest album there's a certain vacancy of the emotion that people love about them. Perhaps it's good that they've gone back to more natural indie rock sounds, they certainly use less synthesisers than on 'Glitterbug' (their previous album), but the this new album just sounds drab and bland in places such as the should-be-bombastic 'White Eyes'. It's a song that sounds okay but nothing more than that. 'Lemon to a Knife Fight' (the lead single) is another example of this. None of the songs are bad, not even the unfortunate 'Lethal Combination', a Strokes inspired rock failure. It does nothing badly just blandly and uninterestingly.

There are of course highlights, such as the really interesting and psychedelic 'Cheetah Tongue', definitely an intriguing song even if some of the lyrics are slightly lacking ("you run me over|my orange cola"). Another great song is the single 'Turn', an electronically tinged track that the band have described as a good accident. I could see it getting bigger in the summer but there's also 'Dip You In Honey' which could be another good summery single.

There are good songs like 'I Only Wear Black' and 'I Don't Know Why I Like You But I Do' and yet there's nothing really to say about them other than complimenting the former's groove and the latter's riff. That's another problem, there may be tight bass grooves and great guitar riffs but the context isn't interesting enough for it to be something to really enjoy.

Overall I have to say that The Wombats 4th album is enjoyable to an extent but when played not in the background it's obvious that it doesn't live up to the debut, however much it tries to call back to it. The debut album was fiery and energetic, this is lukewarm and at times lazy; however, there are significant highlights and therefore I'm giving it a 6/10

Rated worst to best:
11. Lethal Combination
10. Ice Cream
9. White Eyes
8. Black Flamingo
7. Out Of My Head
6. Lemon To A Knife Fight
5. I Don't Know Why I Like You But I Do
4. I Only Wear Black
3. Turn
2. Dip You In Honey
1. Cheetah Tongue