The Rakes - 1989 Single Review

Review of The Rakes single '1989' released through V2/Co-operative.

As one of the few survivors of the whole post-Libertines Rhythm Factory scene, The Rakes always seemed the ones most likely to continue making records long after unwitting bed fellows such as Thee Unstrung and The Others had long disappeared back into the humdrum world of 9-to-5 and such like. Some may even argue it a bit of a travesty even mentioning The Rakes in such disproportionate company as the aforementioned pair - not least the band themselves - but everyone has to start somewhere, no matter how humble in its nascent state of infancy that may be.

Since then of course, The Rakes have encountered something of a rollercoaster existence; if 2005's 'Capture/Release' was seen as a zeitgeist defining opus upon its release, then successor 'Ten New Messages' was something of a proverbial damp squib eighteen months later.

With a third album, 'Klang' already completed, '1989' is the first single to be taken from that record and although its hurried verse-chorus-verse dash for safety and simplistic lo-fi edginess offers a slight throwback to their early pre-V2 singles, it somehow lacks the immediacy or urgency of something so dynamic as 'Retreat' or poignant satire of '22 Grand Job'.

Nevertheless it's good to have them back, even if '1989' doesn't quite fire on all cylinders just yet.

6/10

Dom Gourlay