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The Streets - The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living
Written by Dan Franklin
What is it with third albums?
It seems like every time an artist or band has two decent,
big-selling records behind them these days, they balls it up
on the third. And if it’s not totally shit, it’s overblown,
directionless, or riffing on the band’s own early material
without actually, ahem… pushing things forward.
Examples? Oasis, Eminem, Fatboy Slim, & Coldplay spring
immediately to mind. You know, not terrible records per say,
just a kind of bloated rehash without the decent tunes and
sense of purpose & direction that made the previous records
so enjoyable.
Mike Skinner’s latest, sadly, fits into the above category,
for me. At it’s best, “The Hardest Way To Make An Easy
Living” is passable, at it’s worst, it’s almost so
aimless it’s boring.
Opener “Pranging Out” is decent enough. It basically
starts up from where the previous album finished, and whilst
it’s not a patch on that record’s opener “It Was Supposed
To Be So Easy”, it’s still a pleasant enough
introduction to this new collection.
Things quickly head downhill from there, though, with second
track “War Of The Sexes” being the worst culprit of
all, and possibly the worst Streets track ever released.
There’s just no tune to it, yet it grinds on, searching for
a hook that’s never coming. Hugely disappointing after the
promise of the first track, and really doesn’t improve on
further listens, like I was hoping. Poor.
From there, it’s a straight volley of blandness for a good
few minutes or so, with the slightly-better yet pointless
title-track, & sloppy-dirge “All Goes Out The Window”
also misfiring on an album that really needed to start
picking up by this point.
“Memento Mori” has a decent enough hook, yet the
lyrics (like most of the album) are uninteresting and
aimless, and do little to warm you (or interest you) to the
Skinner of 2006, his opinions, or the life he currently
leads. No longer "like a mate down the pub" then, more like
a mate who won the lottery and now sits at home all day &
moans about the birds plopping on his Ferrari.
Maybe that’s the biggest problem of all.
I found myself emotionally investing in his previous output
as he was talking about things that I could immediately
recognise & identify with. On this new album, I very rarely
feel that at all.
Except maybe on the
fairly-decent, yet bloated paean to a loved-one (his late
Dad), “Never Went To Church”. Though despite all the
hyperbole to the contrary, it’s nowhere near in the same
league as the last record’s wonderful “Dry Your Eyes”,
yet the irony is it’ll no doubt sell twice as many copies,
and be ran into the ground soundtracking slushy TV-shit like
The OC til it’s decided it’s old and the next wet-turd
of a tune comes along that fits in with it’s identikit
fuckface demographic.
“Can’t Con An Honest John” is shit. I should maybe
talk about it in more depth, but nah, it's gubbins.
Lead-off single “When You Wasn’t Famous” is probably
the best thing on here, and by the time it rolls around
it’ll be like seeing an old uncle who buys you stuff, at the
gates of hell. Very welcome indeedy, but all a little too
late. And what the fuck did Kelly Osbourne do on his
back?
“Hotel Expressionism” comes armed with my cheeky-chappy
favourites, The Mitchell Brothers, and it’s a decent-enough
tune, though yet again, lyrically, it just isn’t interesting
or engaging. Who gives two shits about Skinner being thrown
out of hotels even after they claim to be “with it”? I
don’t, and chances are, neither does your Mum. So who’s it
gonna appeal to? What’s the point of it?
Now, “Two Nations” is good. Skinner lists reasons why
the Brits & the Yanks are seemingly on the same page, yet
actually, below the surface, aren’t at all. “We gave you
John Lennon, but you shot him too”. Well, quite. Still
no “Blinded By The Lights” or “Stay Positive”
though, is it.
And that’s the problem. Throughout listening to this
frustrating album you can never stop thinking just how
uninspiring & emotionally-uninvolving it is compared to
Skinner’s greatest statements. In fact, there’s nowt on here
that could compete with anything from the first two records,
and as such it’s hugely disappointing.
Album-closer “Fake Streets Hats” is plain awful, and
all credit to Skinner for at least trying to do
summat different musically, but it just doesn’t work, and
actually ruins the album further just by how moany and
ill-natured it is. A real anti-climax to an album brimming
with ‘em. And he sounds like a pissed-up Jay Kay before that
taxi-driver nutted him one, and well, that’s just not on is
it?
You know, I think Mike Skinner is/was a genius. He’s written
tunes that I’ll cherish forever & play til I die. But as
much as I’ve tried to like this album (and believe me I
really have tried), it’s just so fucking disappointing.
I hope it’s just an off-day, and his next record is a
stirring return to form, but sadly, and I hate to say it, I
sincerely doubt it. Even in interviews, he just sounds so
bored of it all. My advice would’ve been to wait til he’s
really got the tunes, or summat to say, but bills to pay an
all that eh? Can’t help feeling this record exists purely to
keep him in charlie and his record-company (which he
mentions every 12 seconds on this record) going, though.
I appreciate he has to write about his life as it is now,
but fuck me, when it produces a record this cold, this
aimless, and ultimately, this average, maybe it’s time to do
summat else.
This isn't a terrible album. It's just not a very good one
either. And from Mikey
Streets, I for one expected so much more.
What is it with third albums?
Buffet Rating:
5/10
Fancy a taste? Try these:
When You Wasn't Famous, Pranging Out, Two Nations.
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© Copyright Dan Franklin 2006