The Divine Comedy - Bang Goes The Knighthood

The Choice Music Prize bestowed upon The Divine Comedy's Victory For The Comic Muse felt more like a career valediction than simply a nod for best Irish album of 2006. Neil Hannon's ninth album felt like his ninth, the first time – okay, maybe the second if we're to be brutally honest about 2004's Absent Friends – that he appeared to be treading water. The hoot that remains 'To Die A Virgin' aside, it all sounded a bit safe. No matter how accomplished a song like 'A Lady Of A Certain Age' may be, it smacked of something specifically written for Ronan Collins' Radio 1 midday playlist. I mean, how else was my mum prompted to buy the album?!? So would Mrs. Halpin like Bang Goes The Knighthood then? Well, in a word: yes. Hannon, after all, is hardly the most disagreeable of songwriters – but the album that marks the Derryman’s 20th year of recording would certainly broaden her horizons a little more than its predecessor ever threatened to.

Putting dreadful first single ‘At The Indie Disco’ to one side for now, Bang Goes The Knighthood sees Hannon return to his jaunty, playful best. Well, strictly speaking it may be more accurate to say he's back to his jaunty, playful best two-thirds of the time here: 'Can You Stand Up On One Leg' is actually a bit too jaunty, drifting instead towards Hannon’s wilfully silly side, while 'When A Man Cries' goes in the opposite direction, and is nowhere near as affecting as, say, 1999's 'Sunrise'. 'Neapolitan Girl', meanwhile, may be catchy, but it's ultimately a bit middling. The real stinker, though, is the aforementioned radio single, a tune so uncharacteristically cringe-worthy, so infuriatingly smug, that it may act as a barrier to entry for many. And that would be a pity, since the bulk of BGTK is pretty great.

Opener 'Down In The Street Below' is the kind of five-minute mini-epic that Hannon seems to come up with every couple of albums, and it’s easily the finest song he's written since Absent Friends' still-amazing 'Our Mutual Friend'. Topical to a tee, 'The Complete Banker' manages to keep pace; a brilliant lampooning of a group that were certainly due some (see what he did there with the title?) and is lyrically far more representative of the album than its careless first single. It notably features gorgeous backing vocals from Hannon’s Duckworth Lewis Method batting partner Thomas Walsh, and there’s ample evidence here to suggest Hannon's recent sabbatical on the DLM songwriting crease has reinvigorated his approach to the day job. Both 'Assume The Perpendicular' and 'The Lost Art Of Conversation' back up this theory in equal measure, the latter another fine example of Hannon’s knack for executing “why-didn't-I-think-of-that?” ideas better than almost anyone else.

Another source of Hannon’s rejuvenation must surely be his new-found romance with songstress Cathy Davey, and everyone knows that a great songwriter besotted usually results in a mean love song being penned. As if to emphasise that fact, he's written two of them here, with 'I Like' just about pipping 'Have You Ever Been In Love' to the post. It acts as a fine end to an album that more than satisfactory brings The Divine Comedy’s catalogue into double figures. Far from continuing along the tired road that Victory For The Comic Muse was tempting Hannon towards, Bang Goes The Knighthood – though far from perfect – instead has far more in common with the bard’s masterpiece, 1994's Promenade.

Here's to another 20 years so.