Catharsis and crunching guitars fuel Bleached on their breakneck second record

One is a band that understands the importance of hooks and melodies, but that still looks to make guitar music with depth. The other - a group capable of shining a light on the grittier, grubbier side of life in the city. Bleached looked well-placed to occupy both positions when they first emerged four or five years ago; a slew of excellent early singles promised much, but their debut LP, Ride Your Heart, didn’t quite pack enough punch to suggest that a rock and roll sea change might be underway in the City of Angels.

Three years on, they decided that perhaps the best way to capture the mood in their hometown was to put some distance between it and themselves, driving out into the surrounding desert and stopping off at a bunch of locations, Joshua Tree included. With them, they carried significant baggage after a turbulent couple of years; frontwoman Jen Clavin had put an unhealthy relationship behind her, whilst her sister Jessie had not long since been evicted from her home. Perverse as it often seems to try to draw creative positives from personal strife, there’s no mistaking the fact that Welcome the Worms is underscored by something that its predecessor lacked; genuine emotional heft.

You get the impression that both sisters have poured a little more of their souls into this set of songs; they spin engaging tales of the less savoury side of L.A., from ‘Desolate Town’s exasperation at the ennui of the city’s music scene to potshots at the artificiality of the town’s inhabitants on the likes of ‘Chemical Air’ and ‘Hollywood, We Did It All Wrong’. The songs aren’t necessarily any less poppy than they were on Ride Your Heart - the melodies on ‘Sour Candy’, or ‘Wednesday Night Melody’s Blue Album-aping riffs are testament to that - but there’s an extra meatiness to the overall sound where their last LP felt lightweight; the thunderous percussion on “Trying to Lose Myself Again” is a case in point. Accusations that Welcome the Worms is a little bit one-track won’t be entirely without validity; save for intriguing dance-pop sidestep “I’m All Over the Place”, Bleached don’t really break away from the tried-and-true pop-rock template here. When it’s done quite this energetically, though, it’s hard to care - especially when the sense of catharsis is so palpable.