[Released on Polydor]

Words: Gareth O’Malley

Everyone knows what Klaxons should have done when the initial recordings of what would become their second album were vehemently rejected by Polydor last year. They should have said, about as politely as possible, ‘Screw this, and screw you lot. We quit.’ Then, they should have signed to a more flexible label and gone on ahead.

They obviously didn’t. They stuck with the major label and re-recorded the thing. This is the result. We don’t need to say too much about ‘Surfing the Void’, other than, for quite a few reasons, it’s terrible: a crushing disappointment that failed to meet even our expectations, which plummeted the moment we learned of Polydor’s heavy-handed tactics.

The lyrics are abysmal. pretentious guff that an amateur science fiction writer would run a mile from. Musically, they have lost their way entirely. The perfectly decent opening pair of ‘Echoes’ (by far the best song on the album) and ‘Same Space’ point to the record being somewhere close to as good as their excellent debut ‘Myths of the Near Future’, but by the time the atrocious ‘Venusia’ has drawn to a close, these hopes have long since faded. The title track, for instance, is like ‘Magick’ gone horribly wrong, and it’s not even the record’s lowest point.

Melody has been eschewed almost entirely (aside from ‘Echoes’); the octave-distance harmonies have become tired and grating. In short, the ‘difficult second album’, no matter how much pressure the band must have felt while making it, is actually a chore to listen to. A three-year wait for this car crash of an album. At least their label’s happy; but an album this bad should in all honesty perform in a similar fashion in sales. Guys, are you sure this was a good idea?

3.6

Audiovisuals: Echoes