As far as band mission statements go, a desire to make people dance is a damn good one. After all, shaking what your momma gave ya to loud music is not falling out of fashion anytime soon. Even if the music you're shaking it too, does.
So fourteen years after shooting into the mainstream with the wonderfully angular single Take Me Out, and having recently lost a guitarist but gained two replacements, the question is; after all this time can the Glaswegian art-rockers still deliver all-killer, dance-floor filler?
Well, the album certainly proves the band can still stomp their way around a pounding indie-disco beat like nobody's business. The departure of founding guitarist Nick McCarthy diminishing their ability to crank out a jerkily danceable spiky riff not at all.
The twitchy Lazy Boy, with its explosive disco gat blasts, spindly psychobilly fretwork, pulsing bass, stuttering beat and begging to be helped along with refrain of, "Am I gonna get up-ah? Never!" is so catchy it would get the dead dancing.
The percolating bounce of Lois Lane is another easy highlight with vocalist Alex Kapranos proving once again he can make a crowd-pleasingly catchy melody out of the most unlikely of lyrics. "Choices. You made good choices. To change our world. So you could be happy," he sings in his detached croon before the easy breezy song turns into a menacing thud that warns, "it's bleak, it's bleak, it's bleak, at the over 30s singles night".
It's followed by the great Huck and Jim, a song that blends their jittery, Anglo new wave vibes with the wide, swaying stadium chords of Weezer in the chorus.
On Glimpse of Love they go full indie-disco and on the slippery, synthy lead single Feel the Love Go, which comes complete with a stellar 80s sax solo, they demonstrate why people went bananas over them all those years ago.
While their peers have either stalled or imploded Always Ascending proves that for Franz Ferdinand the only way is up.
Artist:
Franz Ferdinand
Album:
Always Ascending
Label:
Domino
Verdict:
More of the same, but better.
