"A" - 'Prang' Album Review

59 minutes ago
2 min read

Tracklist:

Hello Sunshine
Walkover
Bring On The Likes
Shit Summer
All In
Techno Viking
Kings of Lowestoft
Comment Leaver
Back To The Shop
Lifeline

You might have heard of "A", you might even have been a fan but as they haven’t released any new music in 20 years this falls very much into Lazarus territory.

Did anyone actually think after all this time they would release new music? Probably not but here we are, a brand new album, out on the 22nd of May on Cooking Vinyl.

It has been 7,368 days since they last released new music which may be some kind of record between releases.

The band have played live from time to time during the last 20 years but struggled to put out new music for a variety of reasons and even concluded at one point that they may have nothing more to say. Thankfully for us that phase didn’t last so we now have a brilliant collection of songs which is well worth a listen.

While ostensibly they are a punk rock band I’d argue this album goes much wider than that, they are a bar band, a rock band and anthemic joy who have produced a number of sing-along songs which are going to be amazing live.

It’s not an over engineered record, it feels instead like they had fun making it. There are almost hints of chaos during it but that all adds to a brilliant album which should be troubling radio stations and festival stages some time soon.

There are a number of different styles on show, rock, gospel even hints of country.

If this record gets the coverage it deserves, it could be massive.

There are some big themes dealt with on here, loneliness, depression, loss and longing but at the same time there is a swagger to some of the songs. You do get to run an emotional gamut which is what all great albums should do.

Jason Perry has become an award winning producer in the gap between "A" albums but hopefully he’s not enjoying that too much as this is so good having to wait another 20 years for another one feels very unfair.

If you want to listen to a top of the range rock album you could do a lot worse than this. The riffs are perfect, the singing excellent, the rhythm section powerful and as I mentioned earlier a number of these songs deserve to be sung out loud by "A"s devoted fan base, most of whom I’m sure already have their copy of 'Prang' but if you haven’t go give it a listen, you really won’t be disappointed.