Welsh noise rock outfit Mclusky’s fourth studio album The World Is Still Here and So Are We is a defining statement as indicated by its title. As the band’s first album in 21 years – coming a quarter of a century after first releasing their debut album – it acts as the band’s studio comeback since breaking up in 2005. Though the band have been playing live in some capacity since 2014, The World Is Still Here… is Mclusky announcing that they’re not merely back to play old material.
Lead single ‘unpopular parts of a pig’ re-establishes the band’s signature brand of frantic post-hardcore. A scratchy guitar sound that characterised their pre-breakup material is back in full swing, clawing away above an immovable juggernaut of a rhythm section. With an off-kilter vocal delivery that jumps between quiet yet theatrical utterances – like Geordie Greep shyly asking a fast-food worker for tomato sauce – and feral yelps, the track operates on a quiet/loud/quiet stop-start dynamic that adds a hefty force when the instrumentation comes crashing through the ceiling. ‘Cops and coppers’ is carried by the irregular heartbeat of a pulsing bass, as the vocals warble between shrill whines and primitive grunts. ‘Way of the exploding dickhead’ has an itching guitar line that works its way to the surface, vermiculating throughout the verses before joining the heavy rush of the chorus.
‘The battle of los angelsea’ threatens a singalong with an almost pop-punk like vocal hook, knocked away from its pop leanings by an ugly, churning bass and caustic guitars to keep the track anchored firmly within the post-hardcore genre. ‘The competent horse thief’ adds a moment of levity to the tracklist, with a bright guitar riff and a post-punk bassline. When taken in totality you could almost put it amongst the wave of post-punk bands like Squid and Do Nothing – it’s a sound I’m on record as being pretty tired of and, though it’s not that tiresome here and does feel welcome at this point in the runtime, does make me less likely to return to the track.
‘Kafka-esque novelist franz kafka’ makes up for it with a relentless barrage carried by the bass and drums, allowing for a lean two-minute cut of noisy punk. The band follow up with ‘the digger you deep’ which, if you brushed away all the rust and grime, could almost be mistaken for a blues rock homage not unlike Danzig’s ‘She Rides’ in form.
‘Not all steeplejacks’ is subdued, lulling you in with subtle guitar lines, still tinged with a fine layer of dirt but not screaming from a bath of hazardous chemicals. While the obvious move might be to build up to a noisy crescendo, the trio resist the urge and commit to a three-and-a-half-minute dirge that I applaud for its double bluff misdirection (even if it just fooled me, with my urge to drag everything into heavier territory). The heaviness re-emerges immediately with the wince-inducing bass tone that opens ‘chekov’s guns.’ It’s crunchy and leaves a greasy residue, lending a grounding grit to the song right off the bat. This bass tone acts as a promise that is delivered upon in the guitar freakout that breaks out in the latter half.
Bass player Damian Sayell continues to be the M.V.P. on the following track ‘juan party-system’, with a great bassline that allows the guitar to speed headlong into noise. With Sayell having joined post-reunion, he more than earns his keep – especially on the second half of the record in my opinion. ‘Hate the polis’ ends the record on a melodic note, with a triumphant solo – or as close as the record gets, in the form of tuneful tremolo-picking – and harmonies collapsing into a snare roll that announces the record’s end.
The World Is Still Here and So Are We is an impressive comeback album for many reasons, not least of which is because they manage to fit it into 33 minutes and 11 seconds. Not once does the album feel like its fairly short length is down to a lack of material, rather that it’s only as long as it needs to be. Mclusky guides us on a whistle-stop tour of the disparate corners of their sound whilst never leaving individual tracks dissociated from one another. From the grottiest troughs to the closest thing they get to sparkling summits, Mclusky’s first proper album in two decades is an impressive re-establishing of form.
Mclusky: The World Is Still Here and So Are We – Out 9 May 2025 (Ipecac Recordings)
