Hookworms - The Hum

Hookworms have gone a little bit pop for their second album. That’s not to say they’re set to collaborate with Taylor Swift on her next full-length – there are many kinds of pop music, after all - but there’s a definite pop persuasion to ‘The Hum’, anyway, in the same darkened, menacing sense as Suicide or Spacemen 3. Debut ‘Pearl Mystic’ might be a ludicrously daunting act to follow, but by progressing onwards from the murk of their debut into a cleaner, snappier territory, Hookworms have managed to remain thoroughly the same band, without a hint of stagnation or water treading.

‘Beginners’ and ‘Radio Tokyo’ lead the way in the clout department, and increasingly, Hookworms sound like a band comfortable with being immediate as well as complex. It’s not every day drone tracks sit next to extended periods of organ-mashing solos, but then again, not many bands viciously swerve between ideas quite like Hookworms. There’s a focus to ‘The Hum’ that makes it hit with far more clarity than its white noise title suggests. Hookworms are quickly amassing a formidable back catalogue, and who knows where their experimentation will take them next.