Johnny Foreigner: You Thought You Saw A Shooting Star But Yr Eyes Were Blurred With Tears And That Lighthouse Can Be Pretty Deceiving With The Sky So Clear And Sea So Calm
Words: Gareth O’Malley
The juggernaut that is one of the most productive bands in Britain (at the time of writing, they have released sixteen songs this year, even without an album to prop things up) keeps rolling on. Yes, it’s been a difficult year for them: by frontman Alexei Berrow’s own admission, there is a ‘£5000 debt’ hanging over their heads that must be paid off ‘before they can even think about making another record’.
However, they haven’t let financial difficulties slow them down one bit. In a whirlwind year that has seen them, among other things, support Los Campesinos! on their first U.S. tour, the band have massively broadened their musical horizons, and their new EP (hereafter abbreviated to ‘Shooting Star’ because the (brilliant) title is ridiculously lengthy) is proof of their continuing evolution.
It’s twenty minutes of extremes, containing both the trio’s loudest and most delicate songs to date. Who knew they had it in them to write a song as brutally heavy and unquestionably brilliant as ‘Who Needs Comment Boxes When You’ve Got Knives’, arguably their finest track so far? Or at the other end of the spectrum compose something as tender and heartfelt as ‘Robert Scargill Takes The Prize’? You could swear that, along with ‘Yr Loved’, it had been lifted from the ‘We Left You Sleeping And Gone Now’ sessions.
There are moments when the band step back into more familiar territory (as on the relentless ‘Harriet, By Proxy’, the kind of song they do so well - and on that note, Junior Elvis Washington Laidley, take a bow; your drumming has arguably never sounded better than it does here) but for the most part, ‘Shooting Star’ is looking to the future. There’s a two-part song in there as well, quite unlike anything they’ve written: ‘Elegy For Post-Teenage Living’ has a schizophrenic structure, transforming from a guitar-driven riot into something far more gentle, and backed by pattering electronic rhythms, over which Berrow delivers another of the speeches he has become known for, scattered throughout with mischievous self-refences: ‘Maybe we sung too fast for you to catch. I know we sometimes do that.’
As the man himself says, it’s two years and they’re still here. We don’t quite know when we’ll be hearing from Johnny Foreigner again, but ‘Shooting Star’ is a tantalising glimpse into their future. They simply seem to keep getting better, and there are plenty of things they could explore further, each one as exciting as the rest. [GO’M]
9.0
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