3 out of 5

Label: 25 Diamonds

Produced by: Shane Hochstetler (recorded by)

The Who-ism of Call Me Lightning – the pounding drums; the shouted, group vocals; the clean and loud guitar sound; it’s in the group’s name, after all… – continue on their fourth album, Human Hell. While the previous releases found Nathan Lilley shouting ra-rah anthems over the punk-fueled rock, more wistful or directly cynical themes seem to bleed in here, and though those haven’t been absent previously, this seems to push the group to try to “mature” somewhat, and that leaves their pounding musical formula… petering out at points.

Human Hell absolutely kicks when needed, such as on the opening title track, and Never Coming Home Again, which finds bandmember Shane Hochstetler doing amazing production work which mimics that Who sound perfectly, and those aforementioned anthems ring out truest here. Elsewhere, though, while the pummeling drumming and crisp rhythm section never dip, Lilley enthusing alongside, the compositions feel a bit more typical, the bombast dialed down a bit and thus not distracting from how straight-forward some songs are, reminding of early 00s era radio rock – think Razorlight, or a more amped-up Strokes – or stepping back to grunge-gone-mainstream acts from the 90s. Obviously there’s good stuff in both those categories, it just sounds tired in the CML formula, which adds to those comparatively more beaten down lyrical themes, and seems suggestive of why the band has seemed dormant since this album.

I suppose, most sinfully, I don’t necessarily hear anything new on Human Hell, whereas each previous CML disc had a sort of unique shift to their sound. This is the cross-section, perhaps, which means it’s still absolutely a kick, but you’ll have intact teeth and eardrums afterward.