Biffy Clyro - Only Revolutions

[TmcB]

A Bit of History

A good mate of mine once recommended I check out the quirky scottish band Biffy Clyro waaaaay back in the day. We’re talking 2003-ish here.

My first foray into Biffy-dom was Infinity Land, an album as filled with jarring stabs as it was with glorious crescendo and melody. Each song tended to take you on a quick-stop journey through frontman Simon Neill’s mind, which seemed rather chaotic to say the least. You come away from the album feeling as though there were nuggets of blinding brilliance wedged between slabs of strangeness; it comes so close to being brilliant that it frustrates the listener that it’s not quite.

Following that was the three-piece’s more accessible Puzzle, which did away with quite a lot of the chaotic elements, pumped up the hooks and really beefed up the heaviness. This album got far closer to where they should be; plenty of great hooks with jarring quirks scattered throughout. This was a much more complete sounding Biffy, and was far more accessible

Only Revolutions

Finally, their latest release has "past participle of get" even hookier and heavier. Only Revolutions is the sound of a band on the very tip of exploding into widespread release. The riffs are crushing, huge, frenetic and beautiful. The drums and bass are woven tightly together, the guitar going wherever the hell it wants to. This album is the most accessible by far, being produced by GGGarth of RATM and Shihad fame (as was Puzzle). The only thing that can let Biffy Clyro down at times are the lyrics. At one moment they’ll be poiniant and bare-all, the next they are trying hard to be abstract and failing miserably. The lyrics connect when they’re earnest, when they’re not they miss the mark completely. Of particular note is Biffy Clyro’s knack of doing really good covers. They retain their Biffy-ness whilst doing a very interesting cover of the original.

Only Revolutions is a stunning album, one that you point out the weaker songs rather than the highlights. Anthemic at times, fragile at others, crushingly gigantic riffs get you amped up, acoustic songs sprinkled with strings mellow you out.

My picks of the album are all brilliant but vary quite a bit. "Bubbles" has a dancey feel and Josh Homme graces the outro on lead guitar. "Mountains" is their stadium filler and is just massive and full of hooks. "Many of Horror" is a heartfelt, soaring epic, but my favorite is the frenetic, pounding "Cloud of Stink". The two songs that don't quite fit the feel of the album and are a little weaker than the other tracks are "God & Satan" and "Born On a Horse"; they don't quite fit the brilliance of the rest of the album, being slightly too left field. However, they are still rather strong tracks.

This album went on constant rotation as soon as I got it, and that doesn't happen often.

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