Deaths and Entrances

After first listening to My Latest Novel's second album, I had to ask myself 'Why does every Scottish band insist on sounding so windswept and overwrought?'. Is it those cold winds off the North Sea, perhaps, or the booze-and-fried-food lifestyle? Does The Waterboys’ ‘Fisherman’s Blues’ blare 24/7 from the city halls? Is there simply something in the water up there? Whatever it is, they're all at it.

My Latest Novel's first album, Wolves, was an overlooked gem, mixing gorgeous, pastoral folk with hypnotic post-rock and moments of biting aggression. Here, though, they've sacrificed a bit of their individuality and much of their variety, seemingly in a concerted effort to sound more like Frightened Rabbit, whose own second album was a genuine triumph. They've adopted the monochrome production values, insistent rhythms and epically inclined songs of Midnight Organ Fight – perhaps without realising that that record was great not because of those details, but rather in spite of them.

Still, they grow on you. Sounding same-y on the first few listens, the record's nagging charms are slow to reveal themselves – but they get there. This is a bigger, arguably more cohesive album than their debut, and there's plenty to sink your teeth into. Their ear for a hook hasn't deserted them, and nor has their way with an intriguing image: “Shut your mouth like a dragontrap / Wrapped around your fingernail”, sings Chris Deveney in the customary Scottish accent on highlight ‘Dragontrap’. Their ‘big music’ is probably best experienced on the swirling, fantastic ‘If the Accident Will’, which presses all the right buttons, while ‘Hopelessly, Endlessly’ finishes the record on a fitting high.

Indeed, there are no great mis-steps here – they've decided to hit a groove and stick with it – but Deaths and Entrances is a record that could do with a change of pace or texture now and then. Fine though these big, windswept ballads are, a slight lack of light and shade has held them back from greatness this time around. If they can broaden their palate again, they’ll surely get there.