!!!’s eighth album packs a punch, but not a Wallop.
For a band existing within the fairly niche genre of dance rock, !!! (pronounced “chk-chk-chk”) have been pretty dynamic. Their first slew of albums earned them the label of “dance-punk,” alongside the likes of Franz Ferdinand, Death From Above 1979, and the Rapture. It was an odd moniker, but seemed apt given the funky basslines and the 16-beat drums that complimented electric guitar riffs and edgy vocals on tracks like “Me and Giuliani Down by the School Yard (A True Story).” !!! slowly shed the “punk” part of this label as they focused more on straight-up dance music, and 2017’s electronic-driven Shake the Shudder really solidified the change. “Dance-punk” has stuck for some reason, but they’re more disco, house, and funk than they are punk at this point. Just like their frontman Nic Offer likes getting down, you can’t really pin !!! down easily.
!!!’s eighth album Wallop is less about transitioning their style any further and more about revisiting their origins. It’s not really a dance-punk album in the same vein as their self-titled debut or Louden Up Now, but there’s plenty of 90s nostalgia and rock attitude to go around. This is combined with as many dance beats as humanly possible, just as you’d expect from !!!, but the end result packs more of a punch than a Wallop.
In an interview with Billboard, Offer discussed the 90s influences on Wallop, which is a welcome respite from the glut of acts who have extensively mined the 80s lately. You might think that !!! can’t get more 90s than naming their sixth album As If, but the album contains a mishmash of sounds drawn from Britpop, trip-hop, and hip-hop tinted dance music. For instance, the band compared “Rhythm of the Gravity” to the heyday of UK act the Prodigy and “Slow Motion/Slo Mo” to Massive Attack, both apt comparisons. “Couldn’t Have Known” combines acoustic guitar swagger with a house beat, and the result sounds a little like something from the Jock Jams series. The real 90s-esque showstopper comes with the single “Serbia Drums,” an instant classic. It has the “boom boom bap” drum beat of early hip-hop and the same bright electric guitar riffs of As If’s “Every Little Bit Counts.” Offer’s voice here is at its most natural, as he sings of his frustrations with a musical career (“They know we have something they can sell and turn to dust”) and how success and a comfortable lifestyle can still feel hollow (“Why does it feel empty anyway?”). Between the upbeat instrumentation and the heavier lyrics, it’s easily one of !!!’s best songs.
The flow of Wallop is best summarized as “peculiar.” Three songs are split into two tracks, which reinforces that you’re meant to listen to it sequentially, but it’s a fairly uneven listen. The album opens with “Let it Change U,” whose thumping bassline resembles As If’s first track “All U Writers,” and starts the album on a high note. The segue to “Couldn’t Have Known” is a little awkward, as the track lacks a real beat for the first 40 seconds, and that acoustic strumming-filled gap takes a bit of wind out of the album’s sails. However, Wallop regains its footing as soon as the beat kicks back in, and you’re soon treated to the album highlight “Off the Grid/In the Grid.” This two-parter has the same rumbling synths and explosiveness as “Heart of Hearts” from Myth Takes, and co-vocalist Meah Pace really gets the song going with a shout of “the shit got out of control.” The aforementioned “Serbia Drums” follows this, capping off an outstanding five-track run that could have been made into a near-perfect EP.
Unfortunately, things are much less consistent after “Serbia Drums.” “My Fault” feels so dull compared to everything that’s come before, and “Slow Motion/Slo Mo” only really stands out due to its spoken word outro, where Sink Ya Teeth’s Maria Uzor repeatedly calls herself a “total fucking idiot” for not forseeing the current state of the world. “Domino” is skippable thanks to its overly quiet vocals and overly loud sample of a voice stating the track’s name with a stutter over and over. “UR Paranoid” has a good hi-hat beat, but its distorted vocals and heavy synths go beyond rave-like energy into straight-up chaos, just making a mess. The Meah Pace-led closer “This is the Door/This is the Dub” isn’t bad, but just comes completely out of left field with its soulful feel and light touch. You do have “$50 Million,” which feels like classic !!!. Its snarky lyrics coupled with plenty of “na-na-na’s” will remind you of Myth Takes’s “Bend Over Beethoven,” but even this doesn’t come close to Shake the Shudder’s “Imaginary Interviews” as far as latter-album saviors go.
When I was writing about Shake the Shudder a few years ago, I noted that !!! could make a great “best of” album since the band generally made songs that were great and albums that were good. There have been a few exceptions, such as Myth Takes, As If, and at the time, Shake the Shudder, but unfortunately Wallop is not one of them. There are a handful of really excellent songs on the album, and you will want to keep listening to its first five tracks on repeat. From end to end, though, Wallop doesn’t hit as hard as you’d hope.
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