Album Review | Wire - Nocturnal Koreans

On the title track of Wire’s new Nocturnal Koreans EP, Colin Newman sings like he’s a working-class English dad sitting by himself in a Southampton pub, six pints into processing the 500 gigabyte collection of furry porn he just found on his teenage son’s computer. That could well be what he’s mumbling about--I heard the words “climbing the walls” and “Nocturnal Koreans” somewhere in there, but he’s singing softly into a busted mic over a loud, muddy, driving instrumental, so most of the lyrics are unintelligible and all you’re left with is a sense of gentle melancholy.

That isn’t to say I don’t like it, of course: the song was released as a single this February, and had it been released February nineteen-eighty-something instead, I’m sure DJs would have been playing it immediately after “Love Will Tear Us Apart” for years. It’s got a big synth hook, a great sing-along bit where the only lyric is “uhh” (Master P influence here?), and a middle eight that brings in a drum machine and lets the song breathe for a bit and gives it some much-needed dynamics.

The rest of the record is fun (or whatever the equivalent of “fun” is for post-punk bands), but doesn’t live up to the single. “Internal Exile” drops into 6/8 time and tones down the energy while putting Newman’s vocals forward, but it’s a bit dull when the big Pet Shop Boys horns go away. “Numbered” is the second real standout track on the album, with big, angular guitars and an aura of malevolence wrapped in a candy shell, and the whole thing ends up sounding a bit like Chumbawamba in the best possible way.  “Dead Weight” is deadly boring and uses delay effects in lieu of songwriting--it could have gone on the last U2 record. The only worthwhile thing about “Still” is that the opening sounds like L7’s “Pretend We’re Dead,” and that made me think of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, which was a fantastic video game.

As the record hits its first real sea change with “Forward Position,” you’re struck with the impression that a lot of the record is the result of various band members having fun with toys in the studio. The melody is nothing to write home about, but the song’s production is striking, with lush electronics and distant clinking noises and some kind of new sonic element being introduced every few seconds.

According to Wire themselves, Nocturnal Koreans “emphasizes studio construction over authentic performance, using the recording environment as an instrument,” and while that’s true, what they term “trickery” is often used like MSG in a sketchy restaurant to spice up something that should have been thrown out.

After all, the whole record is made up of songs that didn’t go on their last album, 2015’s Wire. There’s an argument to be made that they should have just popped the best two or three songs from this onto last year’s self-titled record, discarded the rest, and called it a day.

Still, Wire is a Very Important Band (important to the degree that my lukewarm feelings on this record will probably inspire at least a few rude but accurate emails about how I’m unable to appreciate anything that wasn’t written by Max Martin), and they’ve earned the right to fuck around with effects pedals as much as they want.

Listen to the single here: https://soundcloud.com/wirehq/nocturnal-koreans-single