Album Review – Twentieth Century by Swansea Sound (2023) (Skep Wax Records)
If the Swansea Sound journey so far has been littered with barely veiled snipes at the music industry that this trio of Hue Williams (The Poo Sticks), Amelia Fletcher, and Rob Pursey (both Marine Research, Tender Trap, The Catenary Wires, Heavenly, etc.) have moved within for several decades, then this superb Twentieth Century album shifts rather than completely usurps such an approach (the lines “We used real DJs once, It was enervating” in Greatest Hits Radio illustrate the attitude is still a constant) in favor of a sideways look at the attitudes of now 50-something indie kids of yesteryear and their increasing despair at today’s version of what they were yesterday.
As such, the initial Paradise track sets the tone, as the repeated “Paradise Got Digitized” line offers a subtle snipe at today’s “Spotify Generation”. This is closely followed by the lines “Cos they love guitars, and all the new trends” in Seven In The Car that highlight the ‘false cool’ of today’s indie youth when compared to the same kids of the 80s and 90s and their more authentic appeal of “I met her at the evening classes, with short hair and two pounds fifty glasses, I asked her, ‘Why did you choose Modern Politics?’ and their Pulp /Common People ‘ indie cool’ reality.
If the Swansea Sound’s ‘glorious snide’ has merely shifted subject matter, then the music has also taken something of a more rambunctious shift with it, as tracks best represented by the mid-album quadruple salvo of I Don’t Like Men In Uniform, the title track, Click It And Pay, I Made A Work of Art, and Punish The Young push crumpled buzzsaw guitars and fuzz-pop through gruff vocals that are all cushioned by the muted jangly indie riffs that still make this so very indie.
However, as much as this album moves Swansea Sound towards a different aesthetic, the album will still appease those who buy it based on the promise of jangly indie-pop and twee that the band members backgrounds promise.
As such, Paradise, Keep Your Head On, Markin’ It Down, and Greatest Hits Radio just about fall off the edge of BMX Bandits twee into a slightly rougher 80s/90s jangly indie-pop vibe that reeks of perfect straight-laced vocal disinterest and the uncluttered midtempo of a 100 Sarah Records/Shinkansen Recordings acts of yesteryear.
This ode to why the middle-aged can be so musically unaccepting of the modern scene is certainly a welcome addition to my 50-something saddlebag of grumpiness!
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