Assemblage 23 is probably my favourite musical act ever, so of course I checked out their latest album
Meta as soon as (legally!) possible, but it's taken me a while to pen a review. There's a good reason for this – so far Tom Shear (the man behind the band so to speak) hasn't released a bad album. Not one. I therefore spent quite a while with
Meta just trying to find fault, since many of this years futurepop and EBM releases have fallen short of the mark for me (VNV Nation, I'm looking at you) and I figured Assemblage 23 must be out of luck sooner or later. It's true that most fans, myself included, might say they peaked with 2001's album
Failure, however the last album
Storm showed that there's life in the act yet. So does
Meta continue the good works?
From the opening track
Decades (V2) this is unmistakably an Assemblage 23 album – the catchy and melodic electropop sound is instantly recognisable. This track is brilliant and sets up the benchmark for what follows, which thankfully does not disappoint. Assemblage 23 has always excelled at two types of tracks – the mournful electro ballad and the pumping chorus floor filler. Both of these frameworks are given a thorough shakedown on
Meta, and whilst there is little in the way of genuine innovation here each track is clearly a labour of love, and not a beat has been missed. The melodic
Damaged is equally powerful as classic track
Disappoint, and the bouncy
Sorry is like a higher tempo
Let Me Be Your Armour, to name just two obvious comparisons. Does this mean the group is resting on their laurels then? Maybe just a little. However when the end result is such a complete and seamless effort as this, who really cares?
I remember putting on
Storm, the last studio album prior to this one, and being a little underwhelmed. It grew on me though. Over the bus journeys with my mp3 player I started to really get into
Storm, and realised it was another winner which just needed a little patience to appreciate. Part of me expected the same from
Meta, but I'd say this album is a lot more instantly accessible than Storm was. True there are a few tracks on here that just sound a bit 'samey' and only reveal their depth after many a listen (personally I skipped the track
Ghosts the first few times I heard it, and only recently started to like it), but at least half the tracks here should carry the title of 'instant hit'. My own favourites are
Madman's Dream (this is beautiful, and might be a new candidate for my favourite Assemblage 23 track of all),
Binary (this track is why we have dance floors!) and
Decades.
So in a nutshell that's it – another Assemblage 23 album without a dud. Believe me I hate looking like a fan boy, but in this case it would be justified. Shears has carved himself a niche as a pioneer of melodic, complex and catchy electropop and he seems to be getting more comfortable in it with each album. General consensus on the Internet is that
Meta is some of his best work to date. Personally I'm not willing to go that far – it's better than
Storm, but still not quite as good as
Failure. Some of the singles that will come off
Meta however will be destroying dance floors if there is any justice at all in the world. Highly recommended.
Meta is out now.
http://www.myspace.com/officialassemblage23
