"Seeing as press embargoes are lifting and people are talking about the record in a bit more detail, time to chime in with my vague first impressions of the album. Yes, I've heard it, can't say when or how but I only got to listen through once and didn't have the tracklisting in front of me. So please consider as a caveat: this will just be an impressions-only kind of thing, until I get to hear the album again when everyone else does.
So, my overall impression upon first listen? It was OK, interesting in some places, a bit dull in others. Although I walked away feeling a little underwhelmed, I do want to hear it again. I have a feeling that it may be another 'divisive' kind of album in terms of fan reaction. Some will decry its lack of hooks or real standout tracks - there was really nothing besides Where's The Revolution that felt what we nostalgic types would call "single worthy" (more on that later). Others will likely applaud it for being an album that rewards on subsequent listens. I'm hoping the latter rings true for me.
Now that you're all suitably depressed, how does the thing sound? Obviously, WTR has given us a few hints that we're not that far away from the sound of the Hillier albums, but I think the one recent article (Rolling Stone?) which said it was a progression of that sound is about right. Personally, I was hoping that they might take a bit of a bigger step musically considering the new producer, but for the most part they've played it safe. However, that's not to say that there aren't some intriguing elements to the production. Despite there not being any true uptempo numbers on the album, there is what I can only describe as a "groove" to a lot of the songs which I would attribute to Ford's influence. There's a certain organic feel to the proceedings that we didn't really get with Hillier's "crunchy" approach.
As has been already documented, political/world-gone-mad overtones are peppered throughout the record. There's a definite moodiness and unease that we haven't heard from DM in a long time, lots of that rough gating on Dave's vocals (think John The Revelator or Lilian) on several tracks; although there are occasions where the whole thing strays a little too far in a "We're grumpy old gits, now get off our lawn" kind of way. I mean, for Mister Martin L. Gore to feel the need to drop an F-bomb for the first time ever in one of his solo songs...? *gasps from the crowd*
As I said earlier, I didn't have the track names in front of me so I can't really comment much on how one song or another sounds. Oddly, I did get a weird feeling from some of the songs - possibly the Dave tracks - that they felt almost artificial in a sense, as if some other songwriter/producers had been tasked with emulating DM and then handed off to Dave to sing over. I know that it's not exactly a new thing for Dave's writing style to have a distinctly different air in some respects, but I got that "not quite DM" feel more than once or twice; something I really didn't get at all from Delta Machine, for instance.
It was difficult to tell what songs might be picked for future singles, assuming that there will be more in the traditional sense. Nothing really jumped out at me in that way. If I was to take a guess, I'd say Scum and So Much Love at a push. The album does continue the trend of the last few records where there are several songs that show great potential, but either the melody simply isn't there or the idea just stops before it even gets started (a case in point being Eternal, which begins with some very promising Black Celebration vibes, building to the point where you start to wonder if this may indeed by an epic Martin torch song along the lines of Home... and then it literally just stops dead.)
So in summary - no, this isn't the Violator-rose-tinted renaissance that many of us moaners believe that DM still have in them if only they applied themselves, and to be honest I don't think we're ever going to get that. The press, I think, in general will rate this one quite high just because of the James Ford being a 'de rigeur' producer factor, as well as lapping up all the political stuff for being "timely" and "relevant", whether it really is or not. I don't think the fans will have as huge a reaction to it, but you never know. As for how I would rate it, tough to say based on a single listen but I'd say 6.5 out of 10, hopefully something that will improve when I hear it again."
