Review Summary: Andrew Falkous thinks your favourite band sucks
Andy Falkous can best be described as a nihilist. As the leader of this Wales based three piece he is generally the focal point both on record and stage. He continually verbally berates fans from the stage (often to hilarious effect), spits vile couplets seething with rage and indignation throughout his entire discography be it with Mclusky or the more recent but also excellent Future Of The Left, and generally loves no one but his cat. However his cynicism can often be equated to him being a realist in these increasingly morally bankrupt times. He is a man that performs and writes music as a form of catharsis and by the sounds of it this prevents him from becoming a sociopathic danger to the general population.
After a promising but disjointed debut in "My Pain and Sadness Is More Sad And Painful Than Yours" Mclusky put it all together with their sophomore full length and magnum opus “Do Dallas”. The album shreds from beginning to end with the band’s signature abrasive guitar tone reminiscent of Big Black and Scratch Acid from the Chicago noise scene of the 1980’s while his vocals are screamed at maximal intensity ninety five percent of the time. While the band would release another stellar album in “The Difference Between Me And You Is That I’m Not On Fire” before eventually dissolving, “Do Dallas” would stand as the most cohesive and finest effort in their trilogy of full lengths.
An album containing this type of music immediately brings to mind the work of one man, Steve Albini, making him the obvious choice to oversee this release. "Do Dallas" contains some of the bands most popular tracks in “To Hell With Good Intention”, “Lightsabre Cocksucking Blues” (recently featured prominently in the Seth Rogen vehicle “Observe And Report”), and “Alan Is A Cowboy Killer” but it also has some gems in the deeper tracks like “Day of the Deadringers”, “Collagen Rock”, and “The World Loves Us and Is Our Bitch”. Like all Falkous related projects the bass is high in the mix and can even take centre stage at points throughout the album. Do Dallas is also notable for containing Mclusky's slowest song, “*** This Band”. While it may be delivered in a quieter vocal tone and a down shifted tempo it is no less pissed off than any of the quicker tracks surrounding it. It is perfectly placed at the halfway point of the album to break up the raw riff based rock that both precedes and follows it.
The album is over so fast that it can often induce back to back spins, however this a testament to the albums high replay value and not a detrimental factor. Recognizing brevity as a virtue was exactly the way Mclusky operated as after releasing three solid albums they quickly came to an end as fast as they had began. They were never the type to hang around any longer than they needed to get their point across and they did this admirably with their entire musical lexicon. Though Furture of the Left are now around to satiate starved fans in need of a fix of newer material from Andy and his drum playing co-conspirator Jack Egglestone (who played on Mclusky’s final album as well), one often gets the feeling there will never again be a band quite like Mclusky.
