For a man who recently declared “I’m basically over”, Stephen Malkmus sounds surprisingly animated on his seventh album with the Jicks. Now 51, the former Pavement frontman still possesses the qualities that distinguished his years with the 90s band – an off-kilter sensibility and a love of language – but there is a newfound readiness to confront the iniquities of the real world. “Men are scum, I won’t deny,” he sings on the dreamy Middle America, a burst of fury built around an ageless chugging riff, while Bike Lane deals with the death of Freddie Gray, a victim of police brutality in Baltimore (“Kick off your jackboots, it’s time to unwind”).
Elsewhere, as if to underline his status as one of indie rock’s great eccentrics, Malkmus makes a decent fist of orchestral pop on the frisky, staccato-like Brethren, and severs all ties with conventional songwriting, revealing an aptitude for space rock (Difficulties/Let Them Eat Vowels). And if a duet with Kim Gordon (Refute) suggests that Malkmus wants to wallow in the past and reprise the woozy rock with which he made his name, its lilting country melody indicates otherwise.
