FEELIN KINDA FREE is the last album released by Australian noise garage blues punk band The Drones, released 2016. But is it good?
THE DRONES were/are a band fronted by Gareth Liddiard (now of Tropical Fuck Storm), a band that had existed for around 20 years out of Melbourne, Australia, and have been making noise the whole time. Known for having an eclectic range of influences and descriptors, the band have been a cult favourite for years, and seeing as TFS's 2nd album "braindrops" is one of my favourite records ever I thought I'd check out Gareth's earlier work, starting here.
The album starts with PRIVATE EXECUTION, and wastes no time throwing the viewer into hellish effects-ridden guitar, before flipping to barren quiet, then back to loudness again. If you're turned off by this point, there's not much of a point continuing. Gareth's lyrics are equally hellish, abstract and unnerving once the verses start. Despite this, I'm not a huge fan of the drum sounds here, and the backing track in general isn't too impressive, but the chorus reveals what the track is really about- "But now I'm feeling kinda free I'm going straight to DVD, I'm losing my ambition, going into remission, I've put it all behind me" seems to be Gareth lamenting on the passing of time on his career and his life in general. The eerie background synths enforce this feeling of hopelessness and danger, but unfortunately the drums just don't tie it all together like they should. That being said, despite being 7 minutes long, the track doesn't drag too much at any point.
The next track, TAMAN SHUD, is much shorter, and to the point, centering on the Taman Shud mystery (which is definitely worth researching) and delivered again with Liddiard's half speak/half rap/half sing vocal delivery. The lyrics are confrontational, with lines like "I don't really care if you're a pedofile" and "you came here in a boat, you fucking cunt". Of course there is context to it but I am not going to baby feed it to you. But it's a good track.
THEN THEY CAME FOR ME is another politically charged track, as you may guess by the name, with these really nice mellow synths in the verses, but the choruses just don't sound very good to me, I don't know if it's just the interplay between Gareth's vocals and Fiona Kitschin's backing vocals, but it just doesn't do it for me. After a while we get a cool instrumental cruise into a bridge, then an extended chorus outro will still just doesn't really work either.
TO THINK THAT I ONCE LOVED YOU might be my least favourite track on the album. Despite a smoky, depressive atmosphere, and some cool lyricism a la "Your heart's lost it's thrust, you're marooned on the moon", it just feels incomplete, and man the chorus is just clunky. Gareth's vocal delivery is clearly impassioned, especially as the track progresses thru it's 6 minute runtime, which it doesn't need at all. Just a real dud.
Side 2 is, thankfully, much better than side 1. Opening with TAILWIND, we're treated to a pretty albeit glitchy instrumental passage, before Gareth comes back in over what sounds like a sequenced drum beat, and feels like he's pondering his own obsolescence, and man, this shows off how good Fiona's backing vocals can be. When she comes in it just lifts the whole track up. The whole instrumental palette here is just fantastic, it's mellow for the most part despite Gareth's borderline enraged singing. I don't really have that much bad stuff to say about the track.
The energy picks up again immediately on BOREDOM, with what could be a throttled guitar and Gareth's vocals are just great here. "Got me a lawyer in the ACT, Got me the fuck out of the PNG" and "On a TV fat with gnash and wail, They got me singing in a different scale" and his delivery is on point. The minute long instrumental outro is totally chaotic, really living up to the track's name.
SOMETIMES sees Kitschin taking a lead vocal role, which are a welcome reprieve from being screamed at by Gareth. Her vocals are way more gentle, and present what appears to be a critique of consumerism from a female perspective. The track isn't too memorable but not offensive either.
Final track SHUT DOWN SETI is the loudest and probably my favourite track on the record. The lyrics flip between commentary on xenophobia and possibly totally legitimate paranoia. Fiona comes in again for vocal duties, singing "There is a wilderness more wild than anything you can conceive" to break up Gareth's paranoid ramblings, and before the track explodes for the last time, Fiona's vocals float in almost tranquility, before the track is just blasted into outer space. with these hammering and pounding drums and an acridly hellish sonic landscape, almost like this would be the consequence for finding aliens. It's a fucking awesome end to an album that might not necessarily deserve it.
Overall, it's definitely a flawed album but if the band is sounding this good after 20 years, man, their earlier records must be awesome. I'll spend the next week digging thru their back catalog and see what I can find.
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