Los Campesinos! - Romance Is Boring

You know what they say: change is hard, but staying the same is torture. Los Campesinos! must be well aware of this, because they have been striving to move away from the sound of their 2008 debut, ‘Hold On Now, Youngster’ pretty much since the moment it saw the light of day. They’ve already said that they no longer want to be associated with what’s become known as ‘twee-pop’, and, well, who could blame them? ‘Youngster’ was the best album the Welsh seven-piece could have made at the time, but, in retrospect, it was a mess. A fantastic, glorious debut record, yes, but an unfocused one. The band had tons of potential, but you could say that said potential wasn’t realised on first attempt.

It took until the release of October ‘08’s ‘extended EP’ (the band vehemently stated that it was not their second full-length, instead referring to it by either the aforementioned, or a ‘record’), ‘We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed’ for LC! to start coming into their own. The musicianship had definitely improved, but frontman Gareth Campesinos!’ lyrics (which had been the band’s main selling point up to then) improved alongside it. The man is an amazingly talented lyricist… but it now seems that those two aspects have finally caught up to each other.

Take, for instance, ‘Romance Is Boring’’s opener, ‘In Medias Res’, which begins with a gentle acoustic guitar melody, but comes to life as the drums kick in. It’s clear that Gareth’s not pulling any punches either: ‘Let’s talk about you for a minute / With the vomit in your gullet’. Moments after the conclusion of verse one, xylophone chimes usher in a darker second section (‘I’m leaving my body to science / Not medical, but physics’), before an instrumental break gives way to the entry of brass and the brief re-appearance of the song’s main idea, before everything fades away to put painful emphasis on the closing lyrics, which rank among the frontman’s most distressing and desperate: ‘If you were given the option of dying painlessly, peaceful at 45 / With a lover at your side, after a full and happy life / Is this something that would interest you…? / Would this interest you at all…?’ Heavy stuff from a band whose last mission statement was ‘It’s you! It’s me! And it’s dancing!’, but this heaviness is not confined to the lyrics. ‘Plan A’ finds the group turning it up to eleven.

Everything here speaks of change, but while they’ve progressed so much from their early days, the band have, importantly, not forgotten their roots and abandoned their old sound entirely. Singles ‘There Are Listed Buildings’ and the album’s title track (the catchiest thing the band have ever written) suggest a more refined take on the sound of their debut.

However, three tracks in particular define ‘Romance Is Boring’, each in their own way indicating just how far Los Campesinos! have come, and just how much that, in little under two years, they have matured as a band. The first of these is the irresistable ‘We’ve Got Your Back (Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown #2)’ which contains the best melody of any of their material to date.

Second is the blistering mini-epic, ‘I Just Sighed. I Just Sighed, Just So You Know’ whose first minute can only be described as goosebump-inducing. ‘First and foremost (and let it be said) I am writing this at 7.10am’. Combined with the tense musical backdrop, the impact of these first two lines is monumental, as it sets up a very fine song indeed, music and lyrics combining to stunning effect.

Its status as the best thing they have ever done would be assured if not for the presence of one song whose name is ‘The Sea Is A Good Place To Think Of The Future’. A devastating four minutes that finds the band finally managing to connect on a deeper level, the only bad thing about it is that it makes the listener wish that ‘Romance Is Boring’ had gone down that route a little more - with the obvious payoff that an album that steeped in heart-rending emotion would be an exhausting listen.

‘Coda: A Burn Scar In The Shape Of The Sooner State’ offers another tantalising glimpse of what could have been. Its heartbreaking refrain of ‘I can’t believe I chose the mountains every time you chose the sea!’ sums up the album perfectly. No matter how hard they may have tried to cover it up, Los Campesinos! have made an album rooted in despair - an absolutely astounding album. Something tells us that they’re not peaking yet; this is not quite in ‘masterpiece’ territory, but here is a rare example of a band that have improved with each release. They’re well capable of a flawless release. Whether that comes in the form of a ‘record’ or an album proper is irrelevant: if any band can do it, this lot can.