Domino Vinyl & CDs

Review: Astonishingly, seven years have now passed since the release of Franz Ferdinand's most recent studio album, the dancefloor-fired colour of Always Ascending. Reuniting the Glaswegian post-punk rockers with former mixer/engineer Mark Ralph (who this time steps up to produce), The Human Fear has been trailed as a kind of extended lyrical meditation on prejudice and fear. It's a notably grown up and musically varied affair, with opener 'Audacity' joining the dots between the jagged guitars and energy of the band's earliest recordings and the inventive, try-different-things arrangements made famous by the Beatles in their golden 1966-67 period. Compare and contrast this with Night Or Day', where fuzzy 70s synths and jangling piano riffs squabble for sonic space with metronomic drums and bass, and the fizzing nu-rave/indie dance revivalism of 'Hooked'.