Brakes - Touchdown

have come a fair old way since they were known purely as an offshoot of British Sea Power and The Electric Soft Parade and they’ve been laying fairly low since 2006’s ‘Beatific Visions’. Now, finally we get ‘Touchdown’, their third record and their first for new label Fat Cat Records, the previous two being on Rough Trade. More importantly, since their last record frontman Eamon Hamilton has gotten married, and it is this event, which seems to have had most impact on the record for it is Brakes most optimistic yet.

As well as containing fantastic songs the record is also expertly structured. Harder rock songs give way to tender country pop, the juxtaposition highlighting the strengths of both and flowing as so there’s never a need to skip a track. The opener ‘Two Shocks’ is standard Brakes fair, but for these guys the adage of ‘if it’s not broke…’ fits perfectly. It’s a great song but is quickly followed by album highlight ‘Don’t Take Me To Space (Man)’ – the best song about alien abduction in a long time (sorry Brandon).

Aside from expert use of brackets, ‘…Space (Man)’ has wonderful lyrics stating that no matter what utopias may await in the stars when there’s a love on Earth it’s better to be on this godforsaken dustball. It shows that whilst Eamon may now be in love he’s not lost his knack for writing songs that are at times completely absurd. It recalls Super Furry Animals’ rockier moments and contains the brilliant lyrics “I don’t care that this world’s corrupted / I don’t want to be abducted”.

Third song on the record is the really noisy ‘Red Rag’, that is bizarrely introduced by a few seconds of jazz piano. This then gives way to ‘Worry About It Later’ and ‘Crush On You’, both being catchy, charming and brilliant love songs. It shows the band have warmed whist still being able to create rock n roll battering rams of tracks that could make Blood Red Shoes quake in their boots. There may now be love songs instead of five second politcal rants (‘Chaney’) but that doesn’t mean all of the quirks have been ironed out. No, we still get references to Kyrgyzstan and a song about reincarnation (brilliantly titled ‘Eternal Return’).

Other songs worth mentioning are ‘Oh! Forever’ a beautiful swelling rock song and a paean to staying under the covers when it’s cold and ‘Why Tell The Truth (When It’s Easier To Lie)’ which showcases the bands ever present Pixies influence. When both the song writing and the musicianship is this consistently good from a band you know there’s something special about them, and this is their third record of brilliance. The only thing we really don’t understand is why there’s not more people buying Brakes’ records.