Cola - Gloss

Cola / GLOSS - The Gloss is almost like a play. Not a rock opera-no-but a performance where the music, lyrics, and changes in light come together to, at the risk of mixing too many metaphors, make some fool's gold. There's cranky dissonance for sure to be found in the more volatile chapters like ""Pallor Tricks"" and ""Albatross,"" with nervous rhythms desperately chasing different shades of distortion in search of equilibrium alongside some of Darcy's finest lyrics: ""I fetishize an ancient mind/To forget my albatross.""

The Gloss is the second album from Cola. From their inception Cola have expanded on the d.i.y. ethic of the Dischord and SST eras, creating potent sounds from a minimal palette of drums/bass/guitar and lacing their songs with winsome one-liners and societal commentary. What's another word for commentary? Gloss, apparently. Never basic, the lyrics reward repeated listening for deeper meanings. David Berman's poetry-via-garage light pennings are an inspiration, as equally so are the lighter side of UK first-wave New Wave and the Dunedin sound. The results are in the pudding: at times sparse and poetic, at others a thrilling, hook-laden good time, as with the cheeky romantic sketch of a one-night stand that is so overflowing with innuendo-cum-journalism talk that it almost teeters over into self-parody. But the results are the right combination of lightheartedness and sincerity. Romanticism is never far from laughter, and equally never far from righteous anger in the music of Cola: ""Pulling quotes now in the dark/Our outlook is restrained/Your tongue might weaken to be-fit your smile/Til nothing ill remains."" 'nuff said. It's an album bursting with energy and wit and ideas-filled to the margins. Out June 14th 2024 on Fire Talk.