Every Throwing Muses album is special. That's a universal truth and has been for at least 3.5 decades. But somehow, in the midst of a freakin' plague year, the blissful ravings of Kristin Hersh, and the racket of the players behind her, is even more special. Holy, even. I joke, but for fans of this band, Sun Racket, the group's newest record, is likely to feel like the injection of a life-saving drug when it drops on Friday on Fire Records.
Joined by drummer David Narcizo and bassist Bernard Georges, Kristin Hersh maps out familiar territory here, but in perpetually new ways. "Dark Blue" works up a nice racket to start Sun Racket even as "Bywater" and "Maria Laguna" perfect a moodier attack. That sort of mid-tempo ramble is perfected on the sublime "Bo Diddley Bridge", a highlight here. The interplay of Hersh's guitar with Georges' bass and Narcizo's percussion is just heaven. It's haunting, eerie, and soothing at all once, and it's one of the best tracks from this band in ages. Elsewhere, "St. Charles" is more cathartic, if less precise, while "Frosting" roars and sways. This one features the sort of Bonham-inspired lurch we heard on recent Muses records, and the drum-work certainly suggests that Narcizo has thoroughly commanded a style unlike what he started out playing in the mid-Eighties.
If Sun Racket seems to work best on the louder numbers, the down-tempo selections are affecting in their own ways. There's a stateliness to Bernard's bass-lines that helps anchor these cuts, and it prevents them from being as diaphanous as they might be otherwise. Hersh's voice works well in lower registers now, even if long-time fans might miss her more corrosive moments. What all this means, in a way, is that Throwing Muses have progressed, with the music evolving naturally over the last few decades. Lots of Sun Racket reminds me of Limbo from a quarter-century ago, and while that might seem to imply this is a throwback record, one's got to remember how different and direct Limbo seemed upon arrival. Sun Racket possesses a similar concise force, even if the tunes (thankfully) splay out in interesting directions, and with the kind of fervor Kristen Hersh brings to any of her music.
Sun Racket is out on Friday via Fire Records.
More details on Throwing Muses via the official Kristin Hersh website
[Photo: Steve Gullick]