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With 'Young Folks', Stockholm's Peter, Bjorn and John came up with a single that eclipsed all of their other output, a top grossing single that was as ubiquitous as gum on the streets and as cheery as fresh winnings. Nevertheless, 'Writer's Block' was laden with many an equal in the guise of 'The Chills', 'Paris 2004' and 'Objects Of My Affection'. So what did Peter Morén, Bjorn Yttling, and John Eriksson do next, but saddle up a conceptual album of seaside tunes that put paid to any pigeonholing and had the brows a-furrowed. On their fifth album, 'Living Thing', the ascetic is ultra minimal and lead vocals are rotated (Peter Morén emerging the stand-out), and again the vintage pop has an 80's electronica flavour married with a baroque sensibility. So, do they have a barnstormer here?
'The Feeling' is a particularly jerky and awkward moment for an opener - minimal a capella that is strapped with hand-claps and whiney vocals sans Peter Morén, while the groovy 'It Don't Move Me' has a minimal 80's indie electro disco beat like Arthur Russell shooting up the charts. 'I'm Losing My Mind' is something of a misnomer and ought to have been called 'I'm Losing the Tunes' as Morén is switched and klunkiness and an indie garage-rock mien are the order of the day, and 'I Want You' is so much adolescent whimsy with lines "...your sister is so sweet, but it's you I'd like to meet..." like a Beatles schmaltzer (nice reverb though).
'4 Out Of 5', meanwhile, has a funereal with a gentle riff and the subtlest of catches from backing vocals, and 'I Want You' cuts a Durutti Column-like reverb twanginess, whilst 'Nothing To Worry About' enlists the help of a local primary school to help out with the shrill chorus on a track that's guaranteed airplay and to get the ad execs hoppity. 'Just The Past' and the crepuscular 'Last Night' keep it minimal, and the titular 'Living Thing' sounds like a genuflection to Paul Simon's Graceland with a percussive heart, soukous-like riffs and Morén busy at his Elvis Costello-like best.
Tom Waits has addressed the sheer undesirability of growing up in his wonderfully cantankerous manner, but 'Stay This Way' could be the kind of thing the legendary Roy Orbison would deliver - poised with delicacy and the most minimal of ascetics as Morén sings "...I don't wanna go back, I don't wanna move on...". We're unlikely to see 'Lay It Down' get the daytime airplay with Morén singing "...hey, shut the fuck up boy, you are starting to piss me off, take your hands off that girl...", (unless Chris Moyles should get obtuse) it does, nevertheless, prove a catchy singalong with its' switch-blade swagger.
The best moments on 'Living Thing' come when Peter Morén sings with all the authority and charge-hand of Michael Stipe nudging aside the band mates, and top marks are due for effort and ability on the the minimal electro of 'Blue-Period Picasso' - a track that takes the innovative perspective of a Picasso painting that falls in love with a female viewer and longs to get down from the solitude a hall in Barcelona, Morén singing - "...the paintings around me, they don't understand me, I'm a bit too early, I'm seen as development". 'Living Thing' straddles the genres and emerges as a grower of an album, less immediate than its predecessor, it does manage to grow new feet whilst tumbling and falling.
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