Mclusky—‘Gareth Brown Says’

Mclusky are a fairly unknown Welsh band that has put out a couple of very good albums in the last couple of years. They sound like pretty much every good noisy rock to come out of America in the late 80’s/early 90’s, and this song comes from their second album, Mclusky Do Dallas. I guess it would be pretty easy to dismiss them as derivative no hopers: there’s little new to their sound, but there’s a sense of twisted fun going on in all of their songs, both musically and lyrically; a blurring of the line between high silliness and catharsis that really makes them stand out from the crowd. Their influences are all glaringly obvious, but Mclusky are one of those bands who have a larger than life personality all of their own despite that sort of thing.

And man are they writing some of the maddest lyrics out there at the moment. ‘Gareth Brown Says’, for example, jerks into existence with the following beauty of an opener:

“All of your friends are cunts/ And you’re mother is a ballpoint pen thief

Notoriety follows you/ Like beatings follow rain”

To which the only sane response is surely: “Yes. Quite.”

There’s an element of the schoolyard taunt in these lyrics. They’re really petty in a wonderfully barmy and sarcastic way that Mclusky seem to be reallyfond of. Check out the second verse of this tune, (“All of your tales are lies/ You’ve never been to Alton Towers”) or any given line from ‘To Hell With Good Intentions’ (“My dad is bigger than your dad/ He’s got eight cars and a house in Ireland, sing it!” ) for other examples of this—it’s everywhere in their music. Which isn’t to say that their lyrics are dumb—quite the opposite in fact. There’s a sort of warped, imaginative wit at play here, but it’s a wit that draws on a kind of childishness that matches the trashy kick of their music perfectly.

The vocals in this particular song serve as a particularly neat example of this interplay between temper tantrum and pisstake, with the deadpan sneer of the verses butting up nicely against the bloodied wailing of the choruses. Except that it’s not that simple—there’s a hint of hysteria in the deadpan bits (the choppy guitars and rumbling bass have a lot of urgency to them, and there’s always something nasty going on in Andy Falkous’ voice) and the screaming in the chorus has an oddly sarcastic ring to it. So there you have it then: it’s a song that is at once frantic and detached, and while this may not sound like this should work on paper, it’s a combination that Mclusky pull off with alarming regularity.

Oh, and by the way—I’m David Allison (Big Sunny D), and I’m glad I could join ya’ll at the weeklong Fluxblog house party.