The Vaselines - Sex With An X

Twenty-one years on from the release of their debut album, Dum-Dum, comes the long-awaited second LP from Glasgow indie luminaries The Vaselines. Despite splitting just one week after the release of that auspicious debut, the twin-attack of Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee’s bittersweet songwriting and delivery has only grown in reputation and cultdom in the intervening years.
 
With the patronage of various leading lights of the ‘90s grunge scene (Kurt Cobain being the most obvious and prominent), tracks like ‘Molly’s Lips’ and ‘Son of A Gun’ have become highly regarded vintage treasures in underground circles, and now – with the band having come full-circle after signing to the home of grunge: Sub Pop – McKee and Kelly have crafted a batch of songs that not only stand shoulder to shoulder with those early gems, but in some cases improve upon them.
 
From tuneful, biting attacks on the music industry like ‘Ruined’ and the immensely catchy ‘I Hate The 80s’ through to sinister, almost baroque-sounding love-lost numbers like ‘The Devil’s Inside Me’ and the haunting ‘Whitechapel’, the hallmarks of classic Vaselines are all here. As well as taking a dig at religion in faux-rockabilly style on ‘My God’s Bigger Than Your God’, the Glaswegians go for all-out cheeky black humour with ‘Overweight But Over You’ (the song’s sparklingly stupid chorus of “Hey, fat momma / I’m a fat man” a joy that increases with each listen), but all such details are overshadowed by the moments when Kelly, McKee and co. tap the source of their original brilliance – namely pure, unadulterated indie-pop gold. ‘Mouth to Mouth’ is simplicity itself and catchier than the flu, while the dual-vocal tweefest that is ‘Turning It On’ will charm the hardest of hearts. If a standout must be circled here, then ‘Poison Pen’ is as strong a choice as any: it’s scaling, fumbling melodies and uplifting, lilting chorus the simplest of guitar-driven pleasures.
 
It’s down to album-closer ‘Exit The Vaselines’ to reach all the way back to that undiluted acoustic sadness of old, and it doesn’t disappoint in the slightest – awkward, chiming, naïve and beautiful, it perfectly sums up an album that may have taken a couple of decades to reach us, but which makes for such a warm, charming and addictive listen that any delays can be easily forgiven.