Romance at Short Notice
The title of DPT's latest album has been attributed to Saki, who concludes his short story "The Open Window" with the line: "Romance at short notice was her specialty."
I, inaccurately, assumed that this was a suitably Edwardian euphemism for a love that charges by the hour. Upon closer inspection, that is to say, actually reading Saki's story, it appears that ‘romance' is meant in the literary and not the literal sense. So it is that DPT's follow-up to Waterloo to Anywhere delivers a dozen impressive adventures with an urgency rightly labelled as romance(s) at short notice.
The album opens with Buzzards and Crows whose Sergeant Pepper styling's suggests a sound that is undeniably English. Barat and co. then grind out Hippy's Son by blending a coarseness of composition and lyric that it not entirely unexpected from DPT, and respite when it comes is in the form of Carl's comforting refrain "hush, hush my love". Plastic Hearts is a catchy invective on our disconnect, tapping into a mood of Neo-Thatcherism (or is that post-Blair?) with an anti-Britpop pulse.
Tired of England, a deserved choice as first single released (at least on Australian airwaves), is a cautionary tale ("don't drink yourself to a lonely death / in casinos, on crystal meth") set to a beguiling beat. The album slides into Romantic territory with Come Closer, and I do mean capital ‘R' Romantic: Blake, Byron, Shelley, and Keats – those blokes for whom England was their muse suffuses this charming track. Faultlines, Kicks or Consumption, and Best Face, shift from the lightness of the preceding tracks and are replaced with grimmer, grittier thoughts and sounds. On these tracks the tempo ratchets past the easy beats of earlier and submits to a harder, slightly industrial mood.
Truth Begins is bleakly beautiful, it captures the agony of despair ("you lose your will / and I can lend you mine") in a manner reminiscent of the late Eliot Smith's Baby Britain: "nothing is going to drag me down / to a death that's not worth cheating". DPT's desperate pace slows to calmly accuse: "you said the pills would sort me out / embolden me against the manifestations of fear and doubt". DPT's truth, to "just hold on for tomorrow", is something to believe in. The last three tracks – Chinese Dogs, The North and Blood on My Shoes – are each products of DPT's diverse musical influences – punk, rock, indie – offering pounding drums, floating guitar plucks and soaring strings.
The act of writing, composing, creating songs is something of a lost art, or at least the realisation that it is an art appears to be foreign in today's Top 40 landscape. Which is why, sadly, it is not redundant to praise DPT for the lyricism of their lyrics. Aside from the few lines quoted herein, any band that can an open a song by protesting "you can't mix with drugs with politics" (as DPT do on Plastic Hearts) has a place in my heart.
Romance at Short Notice is an album that has been crafted with thought and it would be remiss to mistake its craftsmanship for contrivance, just as the lyrics are clever without being an exercise in cleverness. If you enjoy your compulsive listening peppered with contemplative musings then DPT won't disappoint.
PM: 8/10
