Yak - Pursuit of Momentary Happiness

Like some kind of insane immersive process wedged between method acting and an attempt to recreate the mad adventures of a generation of beat poets, Yak’s Oli Burslem seems intent on throwing himself into his art to a semi-ludicrous extent. Case in point: he ended up living in a car for a decent portion of the making of the trio second’s record after pissing his advance away on a global gallivant. We’re not advocating it as a life choice, but for the wildcard singer, it works; ‘Pursuit of Momentary Happiness’ manages to harness even more of the band’s unpredictable live energy while careering between boggle-eyed riffy bangers and booze-sodden self-reflection in truly inimitable fashion.

On ‘Blinded By The Lies’, the singer repeatedly howls to “kick him in the face!” over the kind of fizzing guitars that Jack White (now their label boss) would be proud of; conversely, the title track is a twinkling, 3am weeper that sits firmly at the bottom of the bottle. It’s a record that’s rarely predictable, frequently unhinged and utterly indebted to the absolute nutter at the centre of it. And frankly, if you’re not even a little bit sucked in by the Sabbath psych reimagining of ‘He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands’ that ends ‘White Male Carnivore’ then you probably just need a bit more of whatever Oli’s having.