 For a while there it looked to be like The Saddest Landscape would be remembered above all for that fucking thing that goddamn singer does with his voice. Fans know the one: when Andy Maddox’s vocals start to warble through his tortured screaming, then, all of the sudden, everything cuts out, and we’re just left with Maddox half speaking, half wallowing, panting while he drips in his own sweat as it pours through the speakers. It’s the sound of potency at its most palpable. And then sometime back in 2005, the band just… broke up. You could have heard the tiniest blip. It’s not that no one cared, but more a case of "man, that skramz band with that guy with that voice that does that thing just broke up." "Shit". And it just sorta stopped there. It’s not that the band hadn’t managed to carve out a minor masterpiece in Lift Your Burdens High For This Is Where We Cross, but more that they just never managed to let everyone know about the damn thing.
Fast-forward a couple of years, and suddenly, the 90s are back in again (had they ever left?). Pianos Become the Teeth were the first of it, then everyone decided Envy stopped sucking (lie), La Dispute, although they never quite got the hang of writing songs, had creativity and the attitude to back themselves up, and so on and so on. Oh, and The Saddest Landscape reformed. While fans will be pleased to know that Andy is still doing that thing, most everyone should be excited to hear the band has put out their tightest and most focused record of their career. The trademarks are still there: the jangly whirlwind melodies, cutting up and down through a maze of sprawling songwriting, as well as the shift-in/shift-out dynamic that sees the band taking listeners through low valleys of rumbling bass and twinkling guitar lines, all the way to cathartic peaks of chaotic arrangements that bubble and burst with energy and desperation.
What this is not however, is more of the same. While The Saddest Landscape still maintain their singular sound, it’s one that is, unlike any of their previous records, sculpted to a tee. The difference is this: previously, the band always sounded as if they got caught with their pants down trying to play along side Maddox. It’s not that they weren’t up to it – they were, and always have been – but the point is they always seemed to be playing in parallel, Maddox on the one hand, the band on the other. The gap itself had its own charm, landing the band a DIY sound that made them punk as fuck. But here on You Will Not Survive, the band are finally playing as a unit, twisting and tarrying around each other, pushing, pulling, challenging, and ultimately, opening up themselves to explore what had only been visible on the edges of their sound....full text |
| I am astonished to learn that the Saddest Landscape is still an ongoing band with recording commitments. This is like if, erm, Embassy had reformed in 2003 and made an album. Who wouldn't have raised an eyebrow at that? So I can only wonder whether the Saddest Landscape is out to tweak our coat-tails, that this is some kind of elaborate joke. After all, they name the first song on this album "Declaring War on Nostalgia", and if this band have ever been anything other than a nostalgic revisiting of mid 90s emo then I guess I got it wrong all along. The Saddest Landscape were always all about stars and hearts and blood stained angels, and the lyrics of this song make no pretense at getting away from that "while we sang songs about love and regret, distance and loss, heartache and failure. and i still hear angels but you are long gone". And there's even a bit where Maddox bellows his heart out away from the mic with no backing. And that's where the Saddest Landscape lose me. What on earth is Maddox doing? I am sure this will make me sound like a bastard (fuck it, I am a bastard), but Maddox, you are way too old for this shit. This music should be the sound of 20 year old kids falling over and making a mess, yet unless Maddox is some kid of emo Peter Pan, he must be pushing 30. I even feel a little embarrassed for him. There are too many moments where the vocals get so ridiculous that the songs descend into some kind of ghastly emo pantomime, "Eternity is Lost on the Dying" leaves me speechless, and not in a good way. Which is why I am tempted to believe this is a wry joke, yet the self effacing humour of a band like I Hate Myself is utterly missing here. This feels entirely sincere. The music is solid enough, full of tearful emoting, spiralling guitars, twinkles, breaks, and all the sorts of things you'd expect to find from a band in love with the mid 90s emo. And if I didn't know the history of the Saddest Landscape I'd figure this was a competent slice of emo homage from a bunch of kids having a ball. Look, there is nothing at all wrong with the music. This is a decent album within its genre, well played and tipping its hat to everything that makes emo what it is, the Saddest Landscape know exactly how to craft a solid emo song but the knowledge of where this band has come from, leaves me lost for words. And those so so wrought vocals... I guess, I just don't see it as healthy to be confronting your demons in exactly the same was as you did almost a decade ago. Surely we all must move on sometime. Surely?...full text |
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