ALBUM REVIEW: Galore – The St Pierre Snake Invasion
It’s been almost four years since Caprice Enchanté, the second album from Bristolian hardcore/math rock outfit THE ST PIERRE SNAKE INVASION, and “a lot has changed” is something of an understatement. Now, with third album Galore and their first for underground tastemakers Church Road Records, home to some of the UK’s most exciting and forward-thinking noise, they’ve pushed themselves sonically and creatively to deliver an album that feels less abrasive on first listen and is packed with just as many hooks as we’ve come to expect, all the while reinforcing their cult status as darlings of the underground.
From the opening of Kracked Velvet it’s immediately apparent this is a very different animal to its predecessor; while that opened with THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN levels of frenzied guitar and pacing, Kracked Velvet is just as baffling in its time signatures but its softer open allows for a loud-quiet dynamic between moments that lulls into a false sense of security before the disorienting walls of sound. If anything, the hardcore elements across Galore are dialled down in favour of being more obtuse in those weird time signatures and crooked drum rhythms, but it hangs together with ease.
Take Midas for instance, where new elements such as flashes of LCD SOUNDSYSTEM or SOULWAX come out in the electronic drums and the repeated mantra “I don’t feel” by frontman Damien Sayell offers a quietly menacing atmosphere that builds throughout til the explosive Submechano. The compelling, driving drums anchor a song built around a deceptively simple, earworm riff that at the halfway mark morphs into a pit-inciting monster. The title track itself explores quieter, looser melodicism in a startling counterpoint to Submechano, with a guest appearance from SANG FROID’s Aisling Whiting that balances against Sayell’s own unique timbre.
In fact, Galore as a whole offers constant reinvention and experimentation from a band already known for pushing boundaries; it’s the kind of daring creative leap many bands fear to take but THE ST PIERRE SNAKE INVASION effectively felt pushed into in their refusal to make a pandemic-influenced album lest they date their sound to that period of time. The constant experimentation, from Galore’s quiet melodicism to the warehouse rave mathcore that is That There’s Fighting Talk speaks of a band who have quite deliberately smashed even further past the boundaries they were already dismantling on their earlier work.
It’s near impossible to sum up Galore or even THE ST PIERRE SNAKE INVASION as anything other than entirely unique, a potent force in the UK underground that’ve resolutely flown their own colours from day one. The lyrical ruminations and musical focus on growth, not least informed by Sayell’s own new fatherhood, means Galore makes the almost impossible task of following Caprice Enchanté look almost easy, and by the time the album closes with the raucous I Pray To Liars that twists and turns until abruptly collapsing in on itself, it’s evident that this enforced downtime between albums and the band’s own life changes has resulted in an album that defies easy categorisation and reveals new secrets on every listen.
Rating: 8/10
Galore is set for release on April 21st via Church Road Records.
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