Biffy Clyro - 'Only Revolutions'

A full fortnight (due to my ongoing feeling really really shittiness, and having left my notebook at work) after I planned to post this, here it is.

‘Only Revolutions’ is the fifth album from the self proclaimed “best Scottish rock band from Ayrshire with twins in”, and probably the best band to possibly be named after a Cliff Richard pen.

Garth Richardson, producer of 2007’s ‘Puzzle’ (which spawned a total of six singles) returns, as does the sheen, which he gave said album.

This is evident from opener (and the third single to be released, before the album) ‘The Captain’, it starts promisingly, slightly reminiscent of ‘The Weapons are Concealed’ from 2004’s ‘Infinity Land’, it soon becomes clear, however, that this is the worst thing Biffy Clyro have committed to record, it’s empty anthemics, unfortunately, a fair indication of everything that is to follow.

The album’s second single ‘That Golden Rule’ is about as raucous as things get, incredibly predictable and with a hugely overblown string section, it’s hard to believe that this is the band that recorded ‘Toys Toys Toys Choke Toys Toys Toys’ .

The Josh Homme featuring ‘Bubbles’ is the first song that really grabs my attention, fun, and a little twiddly, it suffers due to the obligatory sing along “There’s a girl…” refrain, which sounds entirely out of place, the last 90 seconds or so go some way to remedying this, sounding as much like the Biffy of old as anything here.

Simon Neil’s lyrics, usually more hit than miss, verge into bad sixth form poetry on ‘God & Satan’:

“I savour hate as much as I crave love,
Because I’m just a twisted guy”

Having said that, the man does have a way with the ridiculous, as during 'Born on a Horse’

“I pronounce it “Aluminium”,
‘Cause there’s an “I” next to the “u” and “n”…
She’s got hooves,
Preposterous hooves.”

Quite.

‘Born on a Horse’ would not have sounded out of place on Neil’s other band, Marmaduke Duke’s last album ‘Duke Pandamonium’ that is until, as is par for the course throughout, a stadium sized guitar part, again utterly out of context.

From then on, there’s not a great deal else of note, more big, sing along chorus' (‘Mountains’, initially released as a stop gap, stand alone single), a couple of b-rate Foo Fighters’ b-sides (‘Shock Shock’, ‘Cloud of Stink’), an 80’s electric piano intro, which is, frankly, fucking cringe worthy (‘Know Your Quarry’) , more bad sixth form poetry (‘Many of Horror’, due to be the album’s fourth single)…

“When we collide, we come together,
If we don’t, we’ll always be apart”

…and a reasonably catchy put entirely unremarkable end (‘Whorses’).

Simon Neil continues to sing in a peculiar half Scottish, half American accent, which continues to grate. To quote the man himself “despite the accent, we’re Scottish” (Marmaduke Duke’s ‘Erotic Robotic’)
It would appear that Neil’s involvement with the aforementioned Duke has played no small part in making his day job more palatable to a mainstream audience, Marmaduke Duke, it seems, is where the stranger aspects of Biffy now reside.

Listening to ‘Only Revolutions’ was not as horrible an experience as I had already decided it would be. The production of ‘Puzzle’, though polished, was a little flat. ‘Only Revolutions’ however, has a much fuller sound, is unashamedly mainstream, and not entirely without it’s moments.

The album takes its name from a post-modern (read: fucking weird) novel by Mark Z Danielewski, sadly though, there is little of that kind of invention here.

A lengthy review I know, but I couldn’t help myself. For three or four years, I adored this band, and then they released ‘Puzzle’, which was a humungous disappointment, the first time this has happened with a band that I really really liked. Thanks G-G-Garth. D-D-Douche.