It’s always a gamble when a band head back into the studio after a long sabbatical. Do you try to emulate your earlier efforts in an attempt to reintroduce yourself and recapture past glories? Or do you strive for pastures new, informed by experiences collected in the time apart? It is appropriate then for Idlewild, a band who have never been entirely easy to pin down, that their first album in five years, Everything Ever Written, manages to straddle the line between them.
Written predominately on the Isle of Mull, singer Roddy Woomble’s current place of residence, Everything Ever Written has been slowly germinating since the band returned from hiatus in 2013, with members naturally coming back together and trading ideas between tours. And it is immediately apparent that the time apart and excursions into various solo projects have done Idlewild good, as there’s a renewed energy and reinvigorated sense of possibility to the record.
Gritty opener Collect Yourself comes out swinging with cranked guitars before laying into a steady groove, while Nothing I Can Do About It veers between gentle wonder in the verses and wide-open ebullient choruses with Rod Jones’s guitar pyrotechnics. There’s a definite American influence in the panoramic open-endedness of the songs here and is most audible on album highlight (Use It) If You Can Use It, a seven-minute slice of unabashed Heartland rock. Through jangly driving verses Woomble gives kiss-off lines like “It’s a wreckage out there, but there’s a heartbeat behind every door” before an extended instrumental outro replete with Springsteen-esque horns, warbly organs, and wiry guitar noodling.
And while wide-eyed rock is the order of the day, the band still have plenty of tricks up their sleeve. All Things Different goes from a dissonant trumpet and guitar warm up into a lazy café session vibe, while moody Left Like Rose’s keyboard hook and clipped drum beats owes a lot to ‘80s pop. Elsewhere, On Another Planet rumbles along in the garage band spirit of their early records with a tip of the hat to The Only Ones, before beautifully contemplative album closer Utopia floats on fluttering keys and ponderous double bass as Woomble croons “Thinking like that just distorts the day, let the wind blow those thoughts away”. It has something of the Isle of Mull’s stillness to it, as if looking out to the horizon for better times ahead, or perhaps realising that the best time is here and now.
Everything Ever Written has big melodies and plenty of fun ideas being tossed around. As a return to recording, it’s a healthy show of strength and a sign that Idlewild have plenty of miles left in them yet.
Review by: James MacKinnon
Out Now via Empty Words
Order via Amazon
Tour Dates
February
26 Strom – Munich
27 Luxor – Cologne
March
01 Lido – Berlin
02 Knust – Hamburg
03 Bitterzoet – Amsterdam
07 O2 ABC – Glasgow
08 O2 ABC – Glasgow
10 The Institute – Birmingham
12 The Ritz – Manchester
13 Roundhouse – London
20 The Academy Dublin – Dublin
21 The Limelight – Belfast