Cage The Elephant - Thank You, Happy Birthday

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A Pixies/Nirvana influenced stonker

Like current UK guitar raves Yuck, Kentucky band Cage The Elephant recapture an era of rock music that is over twenty years old. This second album is basically one long love letter to Nirvana and The Pixies and while it may be derivative it sure packs a whack all its own. In Matt Schultz they have a delicious hybrid of Gordon Gano of The Violent Femmes, Black Francis, and in places the idiot savant mewl of Daniel Johnston. He surfs the big waves of cathartic guitars on Pixies facsimile Aberdeen and lets loose some blood-curdling screams on Indie Kidz, a well-aimed pop at arriviste hipsters. Bursting with attitude and menace, Cage The Elephant deserve to be the big leftfield breakthrough of the year

Alan Corr

Tracklisting: Always Something, Aberdeen, Indie Kidz, Shake Me Down, 2024, Sell Yourself, Rubber Ball, Right Before My Eyes, Tangle, Sabertooth Tiger, Japanese Buffalo, Flow (hidden track Shiver)