Alt-rock quiz: is Flower of Sex the title of Merchandise’s latest album opener, or a Puddle of Mudd parody act? It is, in fact, the former, though A Corpse Wired for Sound does hark back to the stodgy early-noughties US rock scene. It starts strong: the aforementioned song is has the melancholic chaos of the Smiths’ at their stormiest, but what follows is less direct and full of dirge. The reformed punks recently compared their sound to a “distended corpse … forever singing in spite of everything”, and a gnarly, lurching theme prevails, in contrast to the mellifluous delicacy of 2014’s After the End. But instead of summoning fresh ingenuity, the Floridians linger in the shadows of the past. In particular, Depeche Mode’s brutalist sexuality punches through Right Back to the Start – but Carson Cox’s delivery lacks Dave Gahan’s preacher-like authority. Most worryingly, acoustic ballad I Will Not Sleep Here is just one post-chorus scratch away from an Incubus track.
