One of NYC’s most exciting and innovative bands has returned. No, not DNA. No, not Sonic Youth. No not Gogol Bordello… Liars.
Sisterworld is their 5th release proper, and it is everything you could expect from the sonic obsessives. The rhythms still flit between hyperdub affectations and manic hardcore blasts. The guitar still bores through your skull with the familiar short, sharp slapback. Angus’ lyrics still make pretty much no sense at all (example: “why’d you shoot the bear with your gun? ‘Cos it bothered you!”
What will disappoint many devotees this time around is the lack of epic genre shift. The only reason Liars have survived the post-millennial NYC new wave is because of the evolution of their sound between each release.
Debut album They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top riled the listener into a dance-punk frenzy. They Were Wrong, So We Drowned embraced broken beats, staccato weirdness and a 15 minute epic. Drum’s Not Dead (considered by many their masterpiece) focused on the invaluable force of rhythm, adding only primal screams and lush, ominous drone. Their self-titled 4th saw them mix up varieties of more mainstream influences, from grunge, to DC Hardcore, to Dub.
With this in mind, Sisterworld is no great departure. What it does manage to do, however, is blend every aspect of the previous albums into one magnificent, reckless representation of a band who know exactly what they’re doing.
Opener “Scissor” lulls the album awake, with Angus lamenting a self-harming sister to gorgeous harmonies, which are then shredded by a blast of single note dumb punk.
“No Barrier Fun”, “Here Comes All The People” and “Drip” are all slices of tribal, dubby beauty, which pile on the atmospherics and haunt like only Liars know how. “Scarecrows on a Killer Slant” cranks it up with the kind of dumb, distorted aggro-punk reminiscent of “Plaster Casts of Everything”.
“I Can Still See the Outside World” is a fitting departure from the previous track, with major melody guitars leading a subtle madrigal to all places nice. “Drop Dead” is liars at their worst, everything they are well known for, put together in a pretty unimaginative way.
“The Overachievers” is far and away the most fun the band have on this album. Shrieking lead lines give way to a bit of chanting, then a two-note riff plugged down with a drums John Stanier would be proud of in his Helmet days. All this completed by Angus telling the story of a couple who just could not be fucked with most things, except smoking weed, watching the telly, and raising their cats. Brilliant.
“Goodnight Everything” and “Too Much Too Much” are the musical equivalent of the post coital cig; an orgasmic coupling of pulsing beats, tainted melody, the occasional après-crescendo, and finally, sleep.
Sisterworld is released on all formats March 9th.
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