Songs to sing and hum, moods to relish and more, as MacGregor goes powerpop central.

Release Date: 5th April 2024

Label: Chemikal Underground

Format: CD / vinyl / digital

Broken Chanter is David MacGregor, onetime frontman for Kid Canaveral , sometime indie darlings of Scotland’s central belt, the Glasgow Herald’s “new favourite Scottish Band” of 2008. Allied to Kid Creosote’s Fence Collective of bands and musicians, stylistically they, and now MacGregor solo, perhaps contain more similarity to Fence co-conspirator, Johnny Lynch, aka Pictish Trail. Indeed, listening to this, MacGregor’s third under this name, this was the instant reference received, if with a more organic orthodoxy, strikingly commercial tunes allied to a spiky backing, all sung with in his undisguised Glasgow burr.

Don’t You Think That Something Needs To Be Done launches over an insistent 80s bass and drum pattern, choppy guitar and a stabbing keyboard motif. MacGregor sings in a pleasingly insistent tone. It sounds a mix of new wave and semi-electronic indie; early Costello meets New Order, but with a fresher vocal style. Retro rather than dated, appreciating the ear of the beholder and all that. That strong start is added to by You’ve Got To Stop Worrying All The Time, which picks right up from where the last left off, a bonny earworm that establishes fast, now inserting Edwyn Collins into the earlier Costello/NO frame. The rhythm section are alight on this one, all skinny ties, sharp suits and pointy Cuban heels. The band are Charlotte Printer on bass, Bart Owl on additional guitar and Martin Johnston on drums, leaving MacGregor i/c the lead guitar as well as his vocal. And there actually is a guitar solo, economically inserted, much in the way Glenn Tillbrook continues to offer such welcome indulgence to Squeeze, long after guitar solos have become old hat.

The Rain Doesn’t Always Fall On You, a potential riposte to his countryman Fran Healy, starts with handclaps and a bassline dialed in, or nearly, from Under Pressure. More choppy guitar underpin MacGregor’s cautionary lyrics, which, if never quite stated, point out, by implication, it falls on everyone. And incessantly. I’m loving the frantic scrubbing of the six strings that appear whenever emphasis is needed. Costner Interjection follows, which, as well as being one of the shorter named tracks, is a post-punk instrumental of some jagged and gaunt beauty. Short and beguiling. Something More Useful Than Flowers picks up the jangle gauntlet inherent beneath the surface, causing suns to shine, after the rain, everywhere. I know MacGregor is a fan of R.E.M., and this the most overtly REMmy song here. Early R.E.M., of course.

Knock My Pan In is back to clanging guitars; knocking your pan in, at least on his side of the Irish Sea, is to work very hard, as in balls off, I guess. Following the lyrics, it seems to be this rather than the Irish meaning, which is more akin to beating in a face, something you maybe wouldn’t do to yourself, but you can see how the derivations might coalesce. A neat call and response chorus, with vocals from Printerton et al, I guess, to round out MacGregor’s more caustic tones. (Plus, when it ends with knock your pan in, my case is either made or that’s me and etymology over.) Who’s Asking starts with slide and a slower chime of guitars, a motorik drumbeat cradling MacGregor’s “Hold it back, hold it back“. Sparkly guitar creeps in and out and it is another winner. And, if you were wondering what the words Gloom Bop might strive to describe, well, the answer is astonishingly much as they suggest, a cheerfully, maudlin song, with flickering keyboards. All the keyboards, I assume, come from MacGregor, or maybe Printer, and this would be my choice for a single, which is probably why it isn’t. Love the fade of acapella as it ends.

A further short instrumental bubbles up next, Your Latest Moment Of Alarming Clarity, which features background sound, that of a licensed premise, I’d wager, with elegiac piano then tinkling over the top. Distort the pedal in main use. Palate duly cleansed, Actual Bonehead Content is more staccato guitar slashing and rumbling bass, together the sort of racket the early Police were filling out their early work with, always assuming Sting had come from Drumchapel. It gets a tad lost in a talkie bit, but is fine for all that, getting away with it on the strength of the first part of the song, and the abrupt ending. Whether it has anything to do with Oasis guitarists I am unsure, but he is an unhappy bunny: “there is only so much of this shite I can take“, which has me feel his beef is more with the general public and it’s relationship with him. Or with himself. It is a striking song.

If that last supposition is correct, the final track is his I’m Still Standing moment, an upbeat anthem that blows away any pessimism, an ode to persistence and plugging away: So Much For The End Of History (I’m Still Here). And it’s a corker with guitars ablaze and the rolling pound of drums, the repeated chorus shedding the brackets, in an uplifting yahoo of celebration. A perfect postscript for a platter that is plump with an abundance of alt-pop, post punk promise.

Where does the rain fall? Answer: The Rain Doesn’t Always Fall On You…

Broken Chanter online : Website / Facebook / linktr.ee / Instagram

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