A brief recap then before we get started. Mclusky – one of the best bands to come out of Cardiff since the Super Furries. An aggressive and raw band with a wicked sense of humour whose live shows were legendary for their energy and noise levels. After an apparent disagreement between the main protagonists, they split to form two offshoots; Shooting At Unarmed Men and Future of the Left. Curses is the debut album from FotL, Andy “Falco” Falkous and drummer Jack Egglestone from Mclusky plus Kelson Mathias, formerly of the Ammanford-based group Jarcrew. Playing this album for the first time reveals not much has changed, Falkous the main driving force with his unique vocals and twisted lyrics grating against the disparate rhythms and oddly melodic riffs.

Kick started by the jarring riffs and fuzzy bass of “The Lord Hates A Coward” it’s a raw and uncompromising listen. The production is open and reveals nothing but the harsh sounds crafted by the rough and ready instruments, the vocals grating against this wall of noise. It’s no wonder that Steve Albini was such a fan of Falkous, the two of them have a shared belief in all things raw and simple. “Plague of Onces” continues this thread, the riff sounding like an air-raid siren bellowing warnings whilst the embelished vocals scream the lines ”why put the body where the body don’t wanna go“. The pop-twist of “Fingers Become Thumbs” with it’s straight-laced guitars and chanted vocals lasts under two minutes and is a thrilling rush of a song that should, in a just world, scare listeners of Radio 1 into submission and buy something other than The Enemy.

Falkous hasn’t lost his sense of humour either. The anthemic “Fuck The Countryside Alliance”, if it took on human form, would hunt down Bryan Ferry’s son and eat him alive. The twisted lyrical cries of “Tories, tories thanks for the tories!” preceed the repeated “Take a man to his nightmares in a landrover” all echoed over a driving and sinisterly simple guitar riff. “Suddenly It’s a Folk Song” mixes it up a little. Falkous always had an ear for a pop song and this is as close as they come to chart fodder. There’s the sound of keyboard sirens, guitars and vocal harmonies that hide the fact that the song is actually a scathing comment on the music industry’s love of folk tinged singer-songwriters.

Curses is an aural assault on your senses that beggers belief. There may be moments where the aggression is turned a notch, but it’s short lived. As Falkous would want, this is a challenging record that hasn’t had to sacrifice tunes or riffs. The FotL’s cleverly dark lyrics are never too far from the front, backed by a rabid dog of a rhythm section that drags riffs kicking and screaming out of the mix in such a suprising way as to create a melodic anarchy. Surely that can’t be a curse.
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Links
Future of the Left [official site] [myspace] [buy it]