Shadows
Teenage Fanclub
Score:70
Reviewer: Dan Osmolowski
Label: Merge (USA), PeMa (Europe), Liberator (Australia)
Reviewed: Jun 4th '10, Released:2010
Usually ham-fisted and non-essential, ‘best-of’ albums serve nothing more than to remove songs from their intended artistic context and fulfill contractual obligations to tyrannical record labels. Teenage Fanclub’s 2003 compilation of their ‘best’ moments, Four Thousand Seven Hundred and Sixty-Six Seconds - A Shortcut to Teenage Fanclub, was, however, much more than an easy way out. Essential for any music fan, it collects some of the most incisive power-pop from a band that followed a lineage of The Byrds via Big Star via The Replacements. But, like their American counterparts Guided by Voices - whose ‘best of’ record is also an essential companion - they were prone to patchy releases, sometimes wholly brilliant (Bandwagonesque, Grand Prix) but often chaotic, bizarre or dull (A Catholic Education, The King, and Howdy!).
While things have slowed remarkably since the halcyon days of the mid-90s, the songwriting trio of Blake, McGinley and Love (who are now all in their 40s) return for their first album in 5 years; what’s clear is that these Scottish veterans can still pump out a memorable melody. Norman Blake’s ‘Baby Lee’ is high spirited bliss that sits with the band’s best-ever work; likewise, his achingly beautiful ballad, ‘Dark Clouds’ may use well worn metaphor but it is an undiluted statement that wraps you in its melancholy and ultimately radiates a truly wonderful warmth and sincerity. While Blake plays it relatively safe and straight, Gerard Love throws in a few pleasingly subtle shifts; opener ‘Sometimes I Don’t Need To Believe in Anything’ is a little surprising upon first listen - its cool, metronomic clatter is spritely and more ordered than we would expect from Teenage Fanclub and the swirling ‘Into The City’ uses a slight psychedelia that resuscitates the album after Raymond McGinley’s dull and uninspiring ‘The Fall’.
Coincidently, it is with McGinley’s songwriting (who has always been the quietest contributor, save for Grand Prix’s excellent ‘About You’) that Shadows seems to struggle. Both ‘The Fall’ and closer, ‘Today Never Ends’ plod aimlessly and detract from an otherwise positive and focussed record. Overall, there are no great stylistic left-turns on Shadows but nor would we expect there to be; part of the band’s strength has always been to never over-play their hand and to stick well within the boundaries of catchy melody-driven guitar pop.
Unlike their last outing, the disappointing Man Made, there are plenty of tracks on this album that put their hand up for inclusion on a reissued best-of when they finally decide to do it completely on their own terms. One may think, for a band entering their third decade of existence, that the end may come sooner rather than later but, despite the odd detour, Shadows proves that Teenage Fanclub still have the ability to capture your ear and bury those melodies deep inside.
