Review Summary: “Secret Agent of Love” by Benny Hill.
I.
In the eye of the storm tonight it becomes clear that so much has to change
Sometimes you don’t need too many words to characterize an album, even if it contains complex and challenging music. If I remember correctly, in one of the promotional interviews for Dream Theater’s “Black Clouds and Silver Linings” back in the day Mike Portnoy provided a very simple and absolutely fitting description of that album: “four epics and two singles.” Which is exactly what it was. An equally laconic characteristic can be given to “Special Agents” by Pil and Bue: it is an album that contains four straightforward rock songs and four experimental numbers, distributed a bit unevenly in the track list.
Indeed, the first three songs are fairy typical affairs for the duo with punchy riffs, over-the-top singing, and hectic rhythms. They represent the sound of a band that clearly defined its comfort zone and plays on its strengths established on the previous records. The most interesting thing about this batch of songs is that the way they are presented makes them sound more urgent and fervent than they actually are. Only the third song, the title track with wonderfully optimistic lyrics, is actually fast with the guitars picking up the speed from the start. The first two tracks are actually built around mid-tempo riffs, but the unhinged emotions of Petter Carlsen’s singing and the arrhythmic heartbeat of the drums make the songs sound faster and livelier. It is clear however that the band is sticking to an established formula for this first part of the album. All three songs are good, but this type of sound was executed better on Pil and Bue’s previous albums.
II.
In the blink of an eye we wave our safety goodbye
However, for the remaining five songs the band only revisits this relatively straightforward rock sound only once for “Slave vs Master,” the second fastest song on the album with the drums nearing blast beat level of intensity and a thrashy breakdown included towards the end. Otherwise, the album’s latter half contains more experimental tracks that sometimes even see the band venturing into a completely new territory. Not all of these experiments work. I don’t really get the short and disjointed instrumental “End Credits.” Apparently, the band just thought it would be funny to include a track with a title like that in the middle of an album, but I don’t see any purpose it serves beyond this not very original joke. I also have some doubts about the closer “Never Stop (Part 1).” It is a beautiful and well-composed slower song, and those wordless vocalizations provided by Carlsen in its second half are breathtaking. But it also contains some spoken word sections delivered in nasal robotic voice (obviously delivered or processed by some voice generator) which break the flow of the song and leave a grating impression.
On the other hand, songs with the longest titles are the ones that work the best. “Next Morning there was yet a New World” is a moody mid-tempo number that manages to combine anxiety and optimism, while “When You Wake up, Do You Stop Dreaming?” is the first actual ballad in the band’s discography, and it is wonderful. The melodies are simple yet addictive, the lyrics are touching in their wistful reflections, and Carlsen abandons his usual over-the-top approach in favor of tender crooning that reinforces emotional impact of the song.
III.
In you I find my kind of Optimus Prime
Back in 2023, when the album was released, my first reaction was rather lackluster, and I hoped that this current revisiting will help me to re-assess it. That reassessment did happen to some extent, but the album still sounds somewhat diluted to me. The “rocking” songs are good, but do not offer anything new, while the experimentation here is rather uneven. Overall, it’s like watching a third installment of an established franchise, one that still retains a certain level of quality and finds a way to say something new, but frequently retreads what you’ve already seen before and feels a bit tired. Despite that, most of the songs here are genuinely good and the band still retains their unique sound. This may be a tired sequel, but it’s not “Home Alone 3” or “Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.”
