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Pet Needs had a mission: to create “something warm, raw and organic. Something acoustic. Something that felt like the most true take as opposed to the most perfect” as frontman Johnny Marriott put it. The acoustic album that offers the other side of the coin on a band’s sound isn’t exactly revolutionary – just look at label-mate Frank Turner’s two flavours of output as he haunts the fringes of the fringes of ‘Kind Of Acoustic’ as an impossible-to-ignore patron saint – but what this record offers is the chance for vindication. Pet Needs really are as good as you’ve been telling everyone, but not quite in the way anyone expected.
If you anticipated picking up a Pet Needs album that sounded like a continuation of last year’s ‘Intermittent Fast Living’, you’re likely to be slightly confused by ‘Kind Of Acoustic’, as would a casual listener checking them out for the first time. It’s simultaneously what they’ve always sounded like at their core, and nothing like their usual fare. The ‘warmth’ that Marriott and co aimed to create is there for sure, but in the same way that a single candle flame can provide the illusion of salvation in the frozen darkness. The stripped-down version of the Pet Needs sound is so gorgeously empty at times that you wonder how you missed their desperation at first listen when it was teamed with jaunty beats. The drooping tone that opens ‘Fingernails’ veers into spitting meltdown within seconds, and the plaintive ‘here, here’ that outlines the bridge is no longer echoing with indie nostalgia. It’s exposed as begging for any crumb of happiness, which, of course, it always was under the surface. ‘Ibiza in Winter’s deceptive calm floats on droplets of gentle piano self-care, and adding in little pauses. Opener ‘Outline’ is the best example of how the acoustic approach, when teamed with a little bit of punk poetry, can carve a new frame out for how we see a band. Of course, the biggest question is where guitarist George Marriott has been hiding his Clapton-esque guitar slides for the last few years.
It’s not all reflections on the dangers of accidentally getting wasted after a job interview or meditating on one’s own anxiety. There’s a raucous energy in a lot of these acoustic reinventions. The way Johnny slams “you like you never bought a scratch card,” full of vitriol and scorn, is a reminder of what a zinger lurks at the centre of ‘Scratchcard’. The spirit of Mr Get Better is in full flow on ‘The Burning Building’: it’s pure Turner at his most rowdy, but with more snark on the state of the world and even more solos like molotov cocktails than the original take. This is an album that feels like bottled spontaneity, like you’ve just wandered in a jam session in the back of a van. With songs like ‘Get On The Roof’, the shining optimism that permeates such moments when they exist in real life is distilled into every punk rock “hey” and every commanding drop down.
Part of the joy of Pet Needs is their ‘everyman done good’ style of lyricism. They could be the guys who whip out a guitar at a party you’ve been to, putting our inner musings to music in a way that feels personal. This ‘we could be you’ quality is what they’ve maximised in a big way on ‘Kind Of Acoustic’ and the busker essence they’ve distilled makes the whole record a very impressive listen. It wasn’t like they hid some of the darker themes that far under the surface, but giving the space to unwrap the bandages around their inner wounds to make the depths of their sound more visible is a thing of grimy beauty. ‘Kind Of Acoustic’ captures the zeitgeist in twelve bursts of rowdy introspection that burn all the brighter in its more diminished form.
KATE ALLVEY
If you anticipated picking up a Pet Needs album that sounded like a continuation of last year’s ‘Intermittent Fast Living’, you’re likely to be slightly confused by ‘Kind Of Acoustic’, as would a casual listener checking them out for the first time. It’s simultaneously what they’ve always sounded like at their core, and nothing like their usual fare. The ‘warmth’ that Marriott and co aimed to create is there for sure, but in the same way that a single candle flame can provide the illusion of salvation in the frozen darkness. The stripped-down version of the Pet Needs sound is so gorgeously empty at times that you wonder how you missed their desperation at first listen when it was teamed with jaunty beats. The drooping tone that opens ‘Fingernails’ veers into spitting meltdown within seconds, and the plaintive ‘here, here’ that outlines the bridge is no longer echoing with indie nostalgia. It’s exposed as begging for any crumb of happiness, which, of course, it always was under the surface. ‘Ibiza in Winter’s deceptive calm floats on droplets of gentle piano self-care, and adding in little pauses. Opener ‘Outline’ is the best example of how the acoustic approach, when teamed with a little bit of punk poetry, can carve a new frame out for how we see a band. Of course, the biggest question is where guitarist George Marriott has been hiding his Clapton-esque guitar slides for the last few years.
It’s not all reflections on the dangers of accidentally getting wasted after a job interview or meditating on one’s own anxiety. There’s a raucous energy in a lot of these acoustic reinventions. The way Johnny slams “you like you never bought a scratch card,” full of vitriol and scorn, is a reminder of what a zinger lurks at the centre of ‘Scratchcard’. The spirit of Mr Get Better is in full flow on ‘The Burning Building’: it’s pure Turner at his most rowdy, but with more snark on the state of the world and even more solos like molotov cocktails than the original take. This is an album that feels like bottled spontaneity, like you’ve just wandered in a jam session in the back of a van. With songs like ‘Get On The Roof’, the shining optimism that permeates such moments when they exist in real life is distilled into every punk rock “hey” and every commanding drop down.
Part of the joy of Pet Needs is their ‘everyman done good’ style of lyricism. They could be the guys who whip out a guitar at a party you’ve been to, putting our inner musings to music in a way that feels personal. This ‘we could be you’ quality is what they’ve maximised in a big way on ‘Kind Of Acoustic’ and the busker essence they’ve distilled makes the whole record a very impressive listen. It wasn’t like they hid some of the darker themes that far under the surface, but giving the space to unwrap the bandages around their inner wounds to make the depths of their sound more visible is a thing of grimy beauty. ‘Kind Of Acoustic’ captures the zeitgeist in twelve bursts of rowdy introspection that burn all the brighter in its more diminished form.
KATE ALLVEY