ALBUM REVIEW: Bought To Rot – Laura Jane Grace & The Devouring Mothers

The honesty and openness of 21st-century punk has always been one of the genre’s best qualities, and of all the souls being laid bare in recent years, few have been as personal and introspective as AGAINST ME! front woman Laura Jane Grace’s. Her first solo album under the title of LAURA JANE GRACE & THE DEVOURING MOTHERS airs out just as much emotion as her previous albums with AGAINST ME!, whose 2014 output Transgender Dysphoria Blues was not only the band’s finest showcase of songwriting but an open window into Grace’s mind during her transition. Whilst Bought To Rot displays and magnifies the same artistic soul the frame around it feels different.

When opener China Beach starts it struts into the room like it’s possessed by the spirit of Joe Strummer with THE CLASH–heavy guitars and Grace aggressively questioning “are you my enemy, and are we at war?”. This is one thing Bought To Rot does very well, it wears Grace’s musical influences very proudly, there’s a Springsteen denim and blues feel to the instrumentals of Reality Bites in which Grace praises the speciality of finding a genuine person; “You are so real. No one wants to be themselves, they all wanna be someone else”. Amsterdam Hotel Room has ’00s indie touches all over the intertwining riffs and licks and Grace’s vocal patter, as she tells a reclusive tale of being a stranger in a foreign city. Friendship Song has an upbeat pop country bounce to it as the lightest song on the record with delightful lyrics such as “You and me would be a great team in an apocalypse scenario”.  Both the influences and lyrics go across the spectrum on this record.

There’s no way you can pin down Brought To Rot, it simply jumps into whichever genre of rock Grace feels like conveying. This isn’t her country album or her folk album or her softer album. LAURA JANE GRACE & THE DEVOURING MOTHERS‘ sound is liquid, taking whatever form Laura Jane Grace chooses. Whilst that allows significant amounts of freedom, it does also create a lack of structure and almost feels like listening to the songwriter’s scrapbook. It’s a bit all over the place but that’s charming, it feels more human that way.

Another very human aspect of the record is Laura Jane Grace’s tone as a songwriter. We’re used to her screaming political rage or shining a light on very soul. Bought To Rot avoids politics altogether and whilst she’s still talking about deeply personal aspects of her life all over the record, it feels like her venting to you at a bar rather than a deep delve into her psyche. Moments in I Hate Chicago where she’s just ripping on the city she lived in for small things like being crap drivers and deep pan pizza until revealing “you caught me, this is actually just another divorce song”, the song is humorous but reveals a real pain behind the playful rant.

With AGAINST ME!, Grace has a fan base with expectations and previous albums to live up to. LAURA JANE GRACE & THE DEVOURING MOTHERS is a clean slate upon which a 21st-century punk rock hero has simply written whatever she felt. It’s not the most polished or well flowing record, but it’s aggressive, playful, saddening and brutal all in different parts. It’s Laura Jane Grace laid bare with her hair down not caring, it’s a very liberated and human record.

Rating: 8/10

Bought To Rot is set for release on November 9th via Bloodshot Records.