In the nearly three years since the last album from New Zealand's The Chills, Martin Phillipps has seen his profile become more familiar, and his talents more appreciated outside of his home country. A fine documentary about the musician, as well as reissues of arguably the two best Chills albums has brought even more attention his way. And it's fitting that, as he gets older, somehow he sounds younger than ever. I've never felt that more than I feel about the fine new one, Scatterbrain, out tomorrow via Fire Records.
"I know I won't avoid the void eternally," go the lyrics in "Destiny", a charmer on this 2021 release, and, in typical Phillipps fashion, the words go down like honey. Rarely has the singer seemed more obsessed with his own end than now, and he's doing his musing atop some of the most spry hooks he's offered up since the band's big return a handful of years ago. The zesty hooks abound here, though things mellow on a few of the better numbers here. "Hourglass" is wonderfully precise and contemplative, while "Caught in My Eye" treads "Pink Frost" territory before evolving into a lovely ballad on its own terms. The theme of aging and the passage of time reaches a sort of peak on the earworm of "You're Immortal" at the center of the record.
Every cut on Scatterbrain is an attempt to reconcile the divergent threads in the sound of The Chills. For the most part, Martin Phillips makes this all work very well, with even the diversions, like the blunt "Monolith", retaining a certain charm even amid the overall themes of the whole record. The shifts between the light and the dark make a highlight of "Safe and Sound", a number which reveals a snappy contentment creeping through the revered Dundedin sound here in 2021. "Worlds Within Worlds" and "Walls Beyond Abandon" find Martin looking beyond any and all horizons, big and small, with the effect being one of yearning, a reach towards something pure and full of youth.
Phillipps is helpful tremendously by the players in the band now: James Dickson (Bass/Backing Vocals), Todd Knudson (Drums/Backing Vocals), Erica Scally (Guitar/Keyboards/Violin/Backing Vocals), and Oli Wilson (Keyboards/Backing Vocals). Scally and Wilson deserve special praise for the textures and bright surfaces which tether all of this to an ideal of something outside the normal realms of indie rock. Scatterbrain is the sleekest record Martin's offered up so far, but with nary the complications of Soft Bomb, for good and bad. This is a direct record, one which presents the questions and desires of the lyrics with the poetry we're used to from Phillipps, but with a delightful pep lingering around everything here, even the near-ballads. In that sense, Scatterbrain reveals a new confidence in Martin Phillipps, and a vigor that feels fresh, even fresher than what was on the other wonderful Chills releases in this century.
Scatterbrain is out tomorrow via Fire Records.
More details on The Chills via the band's official Facebook page.
[Photo: Fire Records]