Saturday 28 June 2014

Album review: WHITE LUNG - Deep Fantasy

Highlights: well, everything

9/10

I have to say that I could never understand the concept of that ‘riot grrrl’ thing. At best, it feels extremely loose. At worst, it’s just silly. Courtney Love was right about that one. It’s just a big pathetic put-on. I guess The Ronettes were my favourite riot grrrl band.

White Lung are girls in sunglasses with loud guitars and lyrics not necessarily about daffodils and love. Have to be feminists. Have to be riot grrrls.

In a word, bullshit.

So what are they? I’d say roughly one of the most exciting bands in business today. Canada seems to be doing quite well. Deep Fantasy is White Lung’s third LP in five years, and they have been equally ruthless and flawless so far. Their albums last from 20 to 25 minutes (which is a brilliant concept, I would certainly encourage many bands to do the same) and contain songs of such power, sheen and intensity that you will wonder what everyone else is up to.

No filler, just guts. Ten perfect blasts of articulate punk rock bliss. The production is masterful yet again, you will get extreme pleasure picking out the brilliant guitar details of a song like “Snake Jaw”. And it’s not just muscular singing and Motorhead-styled riffage running riots through each one of these songs, it’s also intricate and almost beautiful in its own savage, uncompromising way. 

I’d say “Down It Goes” is a song of the year, but I’d be hard pressed to come up with any sensible reason why that might be the case. Deep Fantasy is brilliant. And never, not for one second, is it anything less than that.


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