The Proclaimers from hell; Arab Strap; are back, back, back and this time they’re happy. (Or, rather, no, they’re not).

Release Date: 10th May 2024

Label: Rock Action Records

Format: CD / Vinyl / Digital

The Falkirk Pre-Mods, as no-one has ever really called them, have been plying their caustic vitriol for many a long year now, something fans of a certain Nottingham duo may find surprising, given, broadly, they sing from a similar hymn sheet. But Aidan Moffatt and Malcolm Middleton are older and uglier by far, their music also offering even greater dark on the underbelly of society. And for that we should be grateful, with this late outpouring following fairly swiftly on the back of 2021’s As Days Get Dark. Not band for a band that has broken up at least twice since their 1995 formation.

As ever, Middleton supplies all the instrumental backing, an increasingly sophisticated mix of acoustic and electric, digital and analogue, guitars, keys, drum machines and sequencers. Moffat provides his prowling beast of the subconscious vocals, his fluent freefall of wordplay, somewhere between taunt and bravado, all in a central belt monotone of intent. The one change is their targets; earlier it would be all be thinly veiled self-loathing, and of the wretchedness of life, whereas now it feels that wider society is more in their rancid spotlight. Targets in the plain sight of all of us.

Allatonceness is an uncompromising start, with as harsh a backdrop, sonically, as they have ever utilised, with pounding drums and a wiry, spidery bass. “They’ve caught your attention!“, and indeed they have. Less your sonic cathedral, more a sonic munitions factory, an acid diatribe railing against social media , slabs of guitar buttressing up against any easy way out. That attention holds into Bliss, with a return to the sort of skittery sequenced synth riff Middleton can conjure at will. Moffatt occupies as close a croon he can muster, a salutary tale, outlining, again, the perils of a life led online, particularly for a woman. A disconcertingly discordant middle eight ramps up the paranoia. Pretty much home turf, then.

Sociometer Blues varies the palette, with house piano chords and scratchy scrub guitars. Am I alone in catching a whiff of Rent in the chord progressions? Are Arab Strap the new Pet Shop Boys, then, if through too many glasses, and always in the dark? It’s a striking thought and it is a striking track, an attack on FOMOs perverse mistress. Woomph! A switch of subject brings up one of the more attractive melodies here, Hide Your Fears, a lo fi lament for the past, as envisaged through charity shop chic. It would be a cracking single, if they still meant for anything: Moffatt and Middleton are on record as saying this is how they approached this project, as a set of singles, rather than any album cohesiveness. (And, for the record, three tracks have been released as such, including Bliss, but not this.)

Summer Season is positively jolly, a bucolic, if bitter whimsy on the Scottish summer and the vainglorious grasp the natives take at the sun. Moffat’s not a fan: “Sun is shining, let’s pretend my lockdown didn’t end. I drink on my own, if you want me, you can find me on the phone…..” A delicate piano line also then reveals Moffat’s ansaphone message. The more ornamental polish of this song is almost glossy, with that attention to detail seeping also into the acoustic guitar progressions of Molehills. When that all might seem too (fuckin’) pretty, to lift the line from the song before, some electronic FX try to steer the song elsewhere, becoming the first one to thus drag a little. Strawberry Moon more than makes up for any shortfall, an infectious mix of fuzz bass, clattery baggy guitars and relentless synth drones on repeat. Piano breaks on through, with notes like moonbeams.Listen in, though, and it is actually a song of personal salvation, or close to, as Moffatt reflects on a bad place in his life, by offering a hymn to the moon: “Big strawberry moon, save my soul; let my body break but you stay whole.”

You’re Not There is simply beautiful, a glorious synth driven love song, not a million miles from Orchestral Manouevres. Love song? Absolutely, if through the lens of a a man messaging his deceased lover’s phone. But neither cynical nor mocking, Moffat imbues it with his gentlest vocal, all the love evident and present. Really lovely, but only a brief respite, with Haven’t You Heard, whilst possessing another meticulously crafted arrangement, being actually little more than a litany of dejected asides to those blind to modern day reality. Sung and played beautifully, mind. Mood duly brought down, the quasi sharecropper blues of Safe And Well is thus given a pride of place. The dauntingly sad tale of solitary death and decay in lockdown, this is songwriting at its zenith, folk music for an electronic age. A compulsory listen.

Exhausted emotionally by that, Dreg Queen is Arab Strap by numbers, harking back to simpler days and times, and a reminder of how far they have come. “It was cold down by the river, and the taxis wouldn’t stop; I had no money anyway“. Sure, with lines like that, it’s good, more than good, but it confirms more that this pony now has a whole new bag of tricks to trot. Last song, Turn Out The Light has a repeating guitar motif that isn’t unlike a siren, a further lockdown flashback, with that, social media and mobile phones all recurring patterns here. “Who needs family, who needs friends?” gives a parting shot of despair, before the maelstrom breaks about Moffat’s diminishing voice. The end.

The love song, You’re Not There:

Arab Strap: Website / Facebook / X (formerly known as Twitter) / Instagram

Keep up with At The Barrier: Facebook / X (formerly Twitter) / Instagram / Spotify / YouTube