Album Review: Twin Atlantic - Great Divide

The Marmite effect - this innocent, and altogether meaty, linguistic expression is suddenly everywhere. Our newspaper writers, politicians, and cultural figureheads are all constant abusers of the trope yet it is all too easy, considering the product’s effective “you either love it or hate it” slogan, not to apply it here too.

Twin Atlantic are, after all, one of those bands that have spent their short careers trying to escape their tag as “the band you’ll either love or hate” and now with Great Divide they take one more step towards eradicating the reasons for it.

The Glasgow band first burst into our collective conscious with a promising, noisome EP, and a gritty, wildly energetic 8-track mini-album, Vivarium. Ears pricked up and, with a future marked out as “alternative rock” icons, the future seemed bright. However, that all changed a couple of years back when they cried foul, claiming their music thus far wasn’t representative of their true selves.

What followed was a sugary full debut album, Free, that softened their impact. With it they had wound up the production levels, and produced a poppier, far less antagonistic record. What the disparity between the releases showed is that, despite their seemingly bottomless talent for writing memorable hooks, they had a slight problem with balance. This inherent desire of theirs for meting out raw power would inevitably excite their more fanatical subverts, yet their love of for the soft touch of an emotion-soaked ballad would naturally appeal to that wider audience they so clearly craved.

The album title here, Great Divide, describes this dilemma and represents their latest crack at bringing the two clashing styles together. Their ballads drive harder here than before and their rockers aren’t as overtly chaotic. There is no doubt that producer Gil Norton, who they’ve stuck with despite his meddlesome overworking of their last album, has allowed the music to breathe a little more. There’s still evidence of his penchant for a multi-layered, more-rounded mainstream sound (even the band’s feedback sounds more like a yawn than a scrawl), but there’s far less intrusion upon Sam McTrusty’s unique vocals than before - and that is a huge relief.

There is no doubting the fact that McTrusty’s rich, thick Glaswegian brogue is a major point of interest, and a defining one at that. There’s such an element of pomp and circumstance in his delivery that it can’t help but work like the aforementioned yeast paste on those who hear it. Virtually unique, it’s something to obsess over or something to run from. Yet when combined with a series of cutting lyrics or a raging crescendo it can be enough to initiate goosebumps and shivers.

On the subject of lyricism, he’s still churning out thrillingly mad lines such as “I put the sun in an elevator and took you to my home / I’m still living on a ladder from the sky to the floor” from “Heart And Soul”. There are some very dubious ones too though. Take “It pulls me back next to the stereo / On the top floor of my grandparents’ home” from “Be A Kid” - that’s one crammed and mangled couplet right there.

Written whilst on tour, the band have drawn deep on all that latent crowd energy to produce a crop of stunning, colour-soaked tracks. Top-heavy, the album initially fires out grooves like confetti with “Heart And Soul”, “Hold On” and “Fall Into The Party” making their mark. Dig deeper into the record and you could make a case for the bouncy “I Am An Animal” and the grunge-influenced “Cell Mate” being up there with the best too, despite all the basic repetition and singalong tripe they attempt to weld to the visceral builds.

So much else though just crashes and burns. All too often the tracks kick off well but have no end product and there is a disappointing over-reliance on soporific, saccharine melodic filler. You can listen to tracks like “Oceans”, “Why Won’t We Change?” or the bass-heavy “Actions That Echo” until the cows come home and you won’t recall a single note, let alone a lyric. It’s most certainly not the case for all the soft-hearted numbers. They absolutely light up the sky with “Brothers And Sisters”, a big emotional pop power ballad with candied hooks and bursts of rampant energy that’ll glue itself to your brain until you find yourself humming it in the most inappropriate of places.


What all this boils down to is the fact that Twin Atlantic’s early material sounded fresh, vital and even a little fragile. Sure it had that divisive quality, but these latest releases (to borrow another well-worn food-related cliché) are a different kettle of fish. Great Divide is a definite step up from the flab of Free, blowing out its cheeks impressively hard at first but it does run out of puff all too quickly. It, too, is patchy in quality, formulaic in nature and retains an unforgivable disingenuous quality. If the band do, indeed, continue to fiddle, homogenize and filter their raw material in this manner, they may never quite achieve record-breaking sales, but they will have one heck of a greatest hits package to dine out on.

Also online @ TLOBF = http://www.thelineofbestfit.com/reviews/albums/twin-atlantic-great-divide

Mini-Album Review: Twin Atlantic - Free

Where Biffy Clyro took a career to hone their sound, Twin Atlantic have nailed it at their second attempt and their album “Free”, with it’s rough edges and unctuous core, hellishly addictive riffs and bitingly honest lyrics, delivered in Sam McTrusty’s thick Glaswegian brogue, are radio-rock’s secret weapon.

A small piece I wrote for TLOBF's Scottish Album Of The Year Award 2012 - also online here.

Album Review: North Atlantic Oscillation – Fog Electric

Somewhere in between the two land masses of Iceland and the Azores, far out to sea, there is a series of fluctuations in air pressure which kick-start a phenomenon known as the North Atlantic Oscillation. It dictates the strength and direction of storms across the surrounding areas and is, naturally, of great interest to European weather girls and boys (or, more obtusely, meteorologists). Why you’d want to name your band after this oddity is beyond me, but at least now you can point at the telly when you spot rubbish weather combined with westerly winds and say “Ooh, look, that’ll be the NAO” and all your chums will be impressed.

When I first encountered this Edinburgh duo (they expand to a quartet for gigs), between the releases of their Callsigns EP and their debut Grappling Hooks, they had rallying hook-laden rock bursting forth from upbeat electronica. Quite how they got from that outstanding and giddying introduction to this soft-hearted, ambient psych-cum-prog shoegazing is a puzzler. But here we are all the same. The busy re-structuring with multiple instruments in action, sometimes all at once, combined with Tony Doogan (Super Furry Animals, Mogwai, Belle & Sebastian)’s tight, dynamic production has left the already-hazy, multi-layered vocals relegated somewhat – and that’s a shame.

The front-end of Fog Electric is most startling, as peeking softly through the backwash from the determined force of ‘Soft Coda’, the tracks ‘Chirality’ and ‘Mirador’ emerge like two pieces of rotting driftwood. With their synth sweeps, high-pitched vocals and twinkly, jazzy washes, memories are triggered of some of the quirkier tracks by those artsy, twee ’90s pop-rock bands like Teenage Fanclub, Jellyfish and Scritti Politti. But nothing can quite prepare you for the atrocity that is ‘Empire Waste’. Those almost gentle beginnings and endings are blown away by thoughtlessly tacky programmed beats as the eloquent vocal is stuffed through the gaping maw of some vast computer, emerging as a volley of robotic bleatings.

Yet the white flag is spared as ‘Savage With Barometer’ rises above its scarred, ever-present soundscape to wrap a meaty bassline around a cajoling set of cymbals, and brush a determined eloquence onto the surface of the piece. ‘Expert With Altimeter’, with its slow build to something more instantly recognisable (think E.L.O. meets Editors) follows suit with 4-4 beats, rock rushes and peaked vocal harmonies. Then, treading gently down once more to the shore to stand in the ebbing surf, the piano-led drift of ‘The Receiver’ and the sublime acoustic guitar backing of ‘Downhill’ leave us becalmed; contemplative once more.

Even though the album’s subject matter, according to singer Sam Healy, concentrates on “searching for meaning in a scientific, post-religious world”, the oceanic theme is ever-present, following the band through the lyrics, album and song titles. It proves that despite this new injection of chaos, they are still following the same compass-bearing in their heads. Yet everything about this album feels as if it contradicts this. Even the little programmed gimmicks – a vinyl pickup rip here, a spot of tinnitus-inducing warble there, all of merely passing interest – mostly seem disconnected from the music.

It’s been a bold effort by the band to step out of their comfort zone and they should be applauded for scoring one or two broadside hits, but there are far too many disappointing splashes for us to realistically believe that they didn’t get too self-absorbed in their project and, consequently, a little bit carried away with themselves. Maybe next time out, they’ll aim for a sunnier destination we can all reach and, at last, we’ll be able to enjoy a share of their treasure booty.

Also online @ TLOBF

Album Review: Twin Atlantic - Free

When you discover a quality band at the early stages of their musical career (and I mean a real band, not one that’s been moulded and shaped by either a label or a fanbase’s desires, nor a band that’s been beaten down by the rigors of the road, but a band with energy, hopes and a love of life, a band that makes the hairs stand on the back of your neck) it really is like you’re the metal detector and you’ve just unearthed this golden nugget. You feel like the very first person to witness the shimmering chunk since its emergence from the bowels of the earth. You feel a bond, an attachment, like a sports fan does to their team. This is just one of the reasons I do what I do, and it explains my relationship with Twin Atlantic.

After sampling the promise shown by their A Guidance From Colour EP, their so-called “mini-album”, Vivarium, hit me like a shockwave; 8 songs, 33 minutes of heart-racing genius. It was almost long-enough and was most definitely meaty enough to qualify for a full-length so I, naturally, always considered it to be their debut. That was until a short while ago when the band announced that they weren’t really happy with it, worrying that in making it they had strayed from the ethos of why they got into music, and that this new album, Free, would be their debut. “This band was meant to be based on integrity,” said vocalist/guitarist Sam McTrusty cryptically. “We wanted there to be a brutal honesty in the lyrics. I think we’ve done that.” Intriguing, no? Well, they’ve got 13 songs and 46 minutes to prove their point.

First things first, if you’re one of our readers who hated the regional accent of Mike Duce (Lower Than Atlantis), then you’re going to absolutely despise the Glaswegian brogue of McTrusty. To me, the guttural intonation and complex drawl doubles the effectiveness of the words, to others it may sound like Simon Neil (Biffy Clyro) is being fed through a mincer. The bad news is that producer Gil Norton (Foo Fighters, Jimmy Eat World, Feeder) appears not to agree with me and has moved his vocal back in the mix and smothered it with layer after layer of harmonies and guitar squall. The result? Their opening big-hitters don’t grab you; they slide across your lugholes in one big long smear. “Time For You To Stand Up”, in particular, is just a song that wanders in, picks its nose and walks out. Sure, it threatens to ignite, yet never quite does. Every time McTrusty goes to scream out the chorus the music is beating him into the background. Likewise, the braids and buckles of tracks like “Apocalyptic Renegade”, “Dreamember” and “Eight Days”, all catchy in their own ways, sound dulled – they’re being throttled, smothered, suffocated from being overworked.

“Yes, I Was Drunk” and “Wonder Sleeps Here” manage to wriggle through Norton’s clutches, escaping with just minor scratches, but then you get to these destructively crass statements like the paint-by-numbers grunge of “Ghost Of Eddie” and the forced post-rock noodling of “Serious Underground Dance Vibes” – these are the songs that will make fans want to tear their hair out. You’ll get to the point where “Edit Me” will suddenly sound more like an invite; an Alice In Wonderland moment where you’ll imagine drinking the bottle and editing the whole damn shebang yourself. And titling their final track “We Want Better, Man”? – they’ve been reading my mind.

If you do listen to one song, listen to “Crash Land”. Actually, considering it’s bookmarked by a rare quality combo of songwriting and delivery, also listen to the enigmatic title-track (“Where’s your passion? Where’s your fire tonight?”) and the heart-breaking “Make A Beast Of Myself” (“You know, you know it’s the end of our sweet universe”). In fact, when they hit you with a trio like this it’s hard not to stand back and applaud. Really though it’s “Crash Land” that is the key to accessing this album – a paired down, acoustic slow dance that proves just how much quality the band have truly got in their locker. The frugal nature of it allows the strength of the vocal to soar, supplemented beautifully by Barry McKenna’s impeccably-reserved cello.

Let me cut to the chase. On one hand, you’ve got Vivarium and in the other you’ve got Free. The former has ingenuity, impetuosity, hooks, jagged edges, a damaged quality. In other words, a raw punk demeanour that has allowed it to strut its way into our minds and hearts. The latter feels like a misnomer. It feels constricted by design, regressively smooth and suave. Rather than spit in your face, this punk kisses you and runs. The pinged strings and ear-scraping feedback that so perfectly marked out the pitch changes and shifts in emotion are gone, replaced with a steady, monotonous muffled hammering. The incredibly cute songwriting and McTrusty’s passionate delivery are still all present but all around him the music has been diluted to supposedly make it more accessible, poppy, radio-friendly, mainstream, bland.

I witnessed the sad demise of Manic Street Preachers and, then, Biffy Clyro, as both bands slowly, steadily sold out on us. I stared in anguish as they set about wringing all the life and passion out of their music. Twin Atlantic… no, let me rephrase that… my Twin Atlantic weren’t supposed to go down this road, especially since Vivarium recalled the edgy, tenacious quality that so marked out Biffy’s early work. This is why listening to this “alternative” debut is so galling on a personal level. Free is just about solid enough to throw these Weedgies into the limelight as planned, but it could and should have been so much more. It seems no amount of polish can get the shine back on this particular golden nugget.

Also online @ The New Review (with samples) = http://thenewreview.net/reviews/twin-atlantic-free

Gig Review: Twin Atlantic @ The Haymakers, Cambridge 25/01/11

The rise and rise of Glasgow’s Twin Atlantic continues unabated. Taken at face value, you’d say they were happily stomping along in the footsteps of Ayrshire’s Biffy Clyro, but the differences between the two bands are just as marked as the similarities are. Listen carefully and you’ll realise the Weegies are actually the more musically creative ones these days.

Despite this, you’d be a fool not to believe that the fact both bands aren’t afraid of banging out songs in their own Scots brogue, coupled with the “incestuous scene” (as frontman Sam McTrusty refers to the world of Scottish alt-rock), has only helped to boost their fanbase.

After watching their mini-album Vivarium released to rave reviews, Twin Atlantic are on the brink of releasing their first full-length and this European tour of the smaller, barrier-less venues may just be their last chance to truly connect with each individual supporter. At this rate, six months down the line, who knows what size stage they’ll regularly be playing on.

Tonight they’re keen to break out new material, despite the album being several months from release, and open with ‘Edit Me’. It’s a raging torrent of rock attitude with a solitary, yet effective, stop-gap lurking in the middle that fires the crowd into action.

They step off the pedal for the chiming epic ‘What Is Light? Where Is Laughter?’, which allows us time to take a look up and marvel at McTrusty’s chiselled features, newly-cropped hair and stubble. His energy isn’t to be found wanting either and he’s keen to impress upon us how delighted he is to be there. “This is our first time in Cambridge and we’re blown away by how many of you have come out”, he grins before describing the city as having “a nice little community”.

The other band members seem a little squeezed on this tiny Haymakers stage with bassist Ross McNae and classically-trained guitarist Barry McKenna often disappearing behind the cumbersomely large speaker stacks. Lurking at the back, the moustache and striped t-shirt combo of drummer Craig Kneale is almost cartoonish – think Popeye, Animal (The Muppets) and Ron Mael (Sparks) all rolled into one. As the quartet batter out their more well-known songs like ‘Human After All’, ‘Better Weather’ and ‘Caribbean War Syndrome’ those gathered move from a respectable stance of quiet appreciation and head-nodding to mouthing lyrics, whooping and fist-clenching.

McTrusty lifts his game further by evolving a deliberate, vicious twitch before delivering his more potent lines (“Blow these fuckers away!”, for instance, from ‘Caribbean War Syndrome’) and, for ‘Audience And Audio’, sinking to his knees to lash out a solo. “Shhhh!” he playfully admonishes, during a break between songs, before following with “This is the warmest/drunkest day of the tour so far” as if those two perceptions go hand-in-hand. Someone responds by shouting if he wants a drink, to which he appreciatively orders “a JD and coke”. It seems they are connected after all!

Each song feels more vital, more anthemic in a live venue. It’s a joy to witness the multiple nuances like McKenna’s electric cello (and his jumping around while playing it), McTrusty’s basic effect of tapping his guitar lead on the connector (to create the on-off buzz that opens the show-stopping ‘Lightspeed’) or the harrowing emotion that sits on the players’ face as they perform their subtler numbers. This all builds to create an unstoppable force, so when they unleash another newbie, the smoother, less anarchic ‘Apocalyptic Renegade’, the crowd are happy to greet it as one of their own.

As a parting gift, McTrusty dedicates the final song, their trump card ‘You’re Turning Into John Wayne’, to McKenna’s passport offering us the information that they’re heading to Germany now and their are seven of them, but only six passports. “You make up the punchline”, he quips before bringing the house down with the line “Have you lost your latitude and longitude?” I’d like to think those who took a risk and ventured out tonight won’t think so.

Also online @ TLOBF = http://www.thelineofbestfit.com/2011/01/twin-atlantic-the-haymakers-cambridge-250111/