It’s a triumphant return; that much is clear. Frightened Rabbit’s fourth studio album, Pedestrian Verse, bustles upon on first listen, with a simple piano riff beginning the long player and a heaving drum and guitar play-off ending it. While the album is greatly fleshed out with elements of synth, piano, guitar, drums, bass and backing vocals – it’s Scott Hutchinson’s often bleak and deeply personal lyrics that shine through.
Setting out to create an album that was less personal and had a broad range of subjects feeding into it, Hutchinson’s intentions changed when he went through a breakup. For me it seems that this breakup really affected him; the number of dark references on this album are almost infinite and intertwine to create a collection of somewhat happy sounding songs that are very, very sad in nature. That isn’t to say that all songs are happy sounding though. The heartbreaking ‘Nitrous Gas’ is a track that definitely encapsulates the themes of the album – “If happiness won’t come to me, hand me the nitrous gas. You can keep all your oxygen, hand me the nitrous gas.” It’s a clear statement; Hutchinson is a man that just wants to be happy. He should be too, Pedestrian Verse is the first Frightened Rabbit album to drop on the major label Atlantic Records and it’s a damn good collection of tracks.
Reminiscent of fellow Scottish rockers Biffy Clyro, Frightened Rabbit are definitely a band that are growing in popularity and musical maturity. Standout tracks include ‘Acts of Man’, ‘Late March Death March’, ‘Dead Now’ and of course ‘Nitrous Gas.’ Oh yes, Pedestrian Verse has definitely gotten me excited about how the Scottish rockers will perform live when I catch them later this year.
Atlantic
8/10
Reviewer: Cormack O’Connor
Dat shit crazy man, keep that nigguh’ trill, dope as material, spraying on dat review baby. Keepitup!
dODope Out.