To be honest: The first thing you notice about The Hives' new album is that all the songs don't sound the same. The second is that the band is mentally ill. The opening 'Abra Cadaver' is straight-ahead garage rock until Howlin' Pelle Almqvist starts screaming, 'They tried to stick a dead body inside of me.' Once he starts panicking about 'transparent craniums' on the song 'See Through Head', it's clear that The Hives have lost it. They think they're Swayze in Dirty Dancing on 'A Little More for Little You', and then go all Tron on 'Love in Plaster', which just might be about erection-moulds.
Sad, but it's probably all good therapy: a set of foaming-at-the-mouth songs to support their egomaniacal delusions. But how long before the asylum falls and they explode in a sorry mess of meatballs and flat-pack furniture live on stage?
Listen out for: The worst guitar solo ever on 'Diabolic Scheme'.
Play: After a frontal lobotomy, when the only things that have meaning are KFC and the film Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla.
MORE ENTERTAINMENT
Bookmark this post with: