393) The Courteeners - St Jude

The only thing I know about The Courteeners is they played Man United’s title party. Football rivalries are petty, I know they are. I support Liverpool. I have never listened to The Courteeners. King of petty here.

Obviously The Courteeners will be devastated to hear this news and since I have decided to snub them it has had a huge effect on their career, over the twenty years they have been together they have released eight albums and every one of them has made the top ten, that’s the kind of influence I have.

Aftershow opens this record just main man Liam Fray and a guitar before the band arrive forty seconds in, the drums never let up, and I see the producer is a certain Stephen Street who knows a thing or two about Manchester bands and as an opener it’s a solid start. Cavorting has a good lyric about the excess of club life over a tune, that again, does not let up.

Bide Your Time I really like, it reminds me of The Libertines at their best and bounces along and is rough and ready, Fray seems a confident sort and Morrissey gets a shout on What Took You So Long? which is all set for the chorus and delivers as does If It Wasn’t For Me, good riff.

Talking of a good riff No You Didn’t, No You Don’t is the best song here it bounces along over a jangly sound as Fray looks back on cocaine use, I like the fact that you keep thinking it’s about to stop and then restarts.

Not Nineteen Forever, United adopted this when they won their twentieth title, not a moment I enjoyed but if I try to forget that this is confident shimmering song with a bit more of a groove than other offerings on the record.

The record ends with Yesterday, today & Probably Tomorrow a nice acoustic touch and a change of pace which we could have probably done with more on this record.

As a debut goes, this has some good songs, a fair few pass me by as I am not hearing a unique voice, clearly I am wrong as they have found that with their success they have had over the last twenty years, I just hope it’s a long time before United are adopting another one of their songs for a title celebration, yes, still petty.

6/10

GIVE IT A STREAM: No You Didn’t, No You Don’t