Gomez: In Our Gun

Gomez’s 1998 debut, Bring It On, arrived in the waning days of Britpop, and at the time, the record stirred interest by offering an earthy alternative to the glammed-up, arena-ready post-mod of Oasis, Blur, and their ilk. Gomez draws from the same blues/folk tradition that’s informed rockers from The Band and The Allman Brothers to Phish and Blues Traveler, but the youthful British group is about as “rootsy” as Beck. Which is to say that, like Beck, Gomez maintains an intellectual remove from its slide-guitar-washed, groove-heavy music. The band’s art-rock leanings ran it aground on 1999's Liquid Skin, and 2000's stopgap B-sides-and-rarities compilation Abandoned Shopping Trolley Hotline did little to contradict its reputation as a collective of talented dullards. Consequently, the new In Our Gun arrives largely unanticipated and unnoted, yet it’s Gomez’s first thoroughly enjoyable record. In Our Gun fulfills the group’s early promise, integrating touches of Radiohead-style avant-garde atmospherics into a set of songs that are on the whole shorter, looser, and punchier than any of its predecessors. The disc starts strong with the sound of winding audiotape, followed by a gutty, repeating acoustic-guitar riff, then a high, raspy Ian Ball vocal, and then mayhem: Drummer Olly Peacock begins beating the hell out of his kit, and a low rumble of organ and electric-guitar noise explodes into a horn line stolen from The Beastie Boys’ “Brass Monkey.” The song, “Shot Shot,” is deliriously greasy, and flavored further by a supple bridge. The throaty, Eddie Vedder-esque Ben Ottewell (who shares lead-singer duties with the wispier, less distinctive Ball and Tom Gray) makes his first vocal appearance on the next track, “Rex Kramer,” which has the portentous swirl of vintage Gomez, only lighter in tone. In Our Gun bounces on from there, dropping catchy instrumental nuggets between the chant-like singing and the funky rhythms, and connecting the pieces with brief snatches of chaotic electronic noise. The energized, unpredictable mix is similar to Wilco’s majestic Yankee Hotel Foxtrot in its dual sense of beauty and confusion, and while Gomez lacks Wilco’s dart-to-the-heart compositional skills, the woozy “Ruff Stuff,” the gently cresting “Sound Of Sounds,” the pulsing “Drench,” and the hat-in-the-air “Ballad Of Nice & Easy” have their own indescribable incandescent glow.