Over eight studio albums, Cass McCombs has been accumulating admirers and plaudits. Now, having switched labels, he’s poised for the push to the big time. Well, sort of. Mangy Love sees McCombs park the Americana and alt-rock, and explore 80s-styled AOR, all sleekly melodic guitar lines (opener Bum Bum Bum has a spiralling guitar topline that’s hypnotically transcendent) and subdued moods. It means he repeats some of the worst offences of 80s-styled AOR, too, though: someone should have told him that Laughter Is the Best Medicine really doesn’t need a smooth sax intro, nor a reggae-lite chorus (though it’s nowhere near matching Tom Petty’s Don’t Pull Me Over for AOR reggae-lite horror).
But then you get to the lyrics. Rancid Girl is so unpleasant – “I’d hate you / But I want you more / You could make a lot of money / I’ll say no more / You’re rancid” – that it’s almost a relief when its riff is so monotonous you never want to hear it again. There’s a lot here that’s really terrific, where the oddness of the lyrics and the mood of the music match perfectly and disconcertingly, as on In a Chinese Alley. But the missteps, when they come, are jarringly horrible.
