2 out of 5

Label: Vertigo

Produced by: Dave Sardy, Tony Doogan

I am so glad that the rock revival things of the early 2000s ultimately didn’t last that long. As with any genre spike, some bands were better than others, but, personally, it just wasn’t a genre that held much for me, while being close to something that did. When it was boy bands or nu metal, because that was out of my range, it was easier to set aside; because groups like The Strokes and The Libertines and etc. had crossover with aspects of rock and pop I enjoy, elements began infiltrating various subgenres, and it was seemingly omnipresent in a way I just had to deal with in the bands I’d previously dug who were touched by it. But the core sound rather bored me to tears.

That’s me, I get that. However, it’s framing for how I started to listening to music at that point: trying to appreciate these bands by degrees, and to be able, in whatever way, to appreciate them. With that mindset, and with faith in producer Dave Sardy handling about half the album’s tracks, Dirty Pretty Things’ Waterloo To Anywhere is still one of the most milquetoast releases from this genre I’ve heard.

At the same time: the album undoubtedly rocks. It’s packed with nervy hooks and fun harmonies, and even if the lyrics have a sing-song predictability to them, I feel like Carl Barat – ex-Libertine, embroiled in whatever ex-band drama was happening – gave their penning an honest effort. Some tracks legitimately get me tapping my toe by jumping between punky hooks and Britpop bop (Deadwood, The Enemy), or by the band just giving their energetic all, such as on closer Last Of The Small Town Playboys. But, eh, even in those tracks, there are these drop-dead moments where the song diverts from something that approaches a unique sound and falls back on whatever we might consider a rock-revival shtick – a kind of chord progression and offhand singing style you heard in all of these things. That gets combined with Barat’s indistinct voice, and the primarily safe songwriting and production – even with Sardy at the helm, this thing lacks his usual rawness, and is mixed to a very studio concocted version of “edgy” – to make the music almost offensively bland. Like, at any given point, I think I’m listening to one of a few different bands, from OkGo to, yeah, The Libertines, except you hit those drop-dead points where the energy dissipates and even that sounds-like factor doesn’t carry things too far.

The singles are catchy. If this was one of the first few bands you heard in the scene, it undoubtedly represents it effectively, and I can understand that equating to regular playback. But then I think once you’ve heard some of the more enduring efforts from which it drops, Waterloo To Anywhere will easily be relegated to a lower tier.