MEMBRANES - WHAT NATURE GIVES… NATURE TAKES AWAY
This is a thoroughly original, utterly enthralling album that deserves a place in your collection.
Formed in Blackpool in 1977, by my reckoning this is Membranes’ eighth album. 2015’s Dark Matter/Dark Energy was a stormer from one of the best bands to come out of the post-punk movement but this is even better.
It isn't always the most immediate of listens but it is a soulful, powerful, inventive, questing take on rock music. But, as you would expect from guest appearances from folk legend Shirley Collins, punk trailblazer Jordan Mooney, naturalist Chris Packham and more - plus the band’s own 20-piece choir - this 16 song, nature-themed double LP is not just another rock record.
I did worry that a double LP featuring a choir might be, well, a bit too prog. Whilst that much maligned of genres can be far better than its reputation may suggest, this is far from prog. At its rockiest, there is an almost Motörhead-meets-Ramones vibe but there are also psych drones, dub touches that could be straight outta Lee “Scratch” Perry’s Black Ark and song structures that verge on jazz. Oh, at times those choristers are the stars of the show.
This is a thoroughly original, utterly enthralling album that deserves a place in your collection.
10/10
