At long last, the day of prophecy has come to pass. More than two decades after the release of their most recent LP The Difference Between Me And You Is That I’m Not On Fire, the ultra-clever Welsh noise-rockers Mclusky have a new album ready to go. Mclusky broke up in 2005 and returned in 2020. In 2023, they released a new four-song EP to fund their delayed US tour. Last year, the band signed with Ipecac Recordings, a label that's been snapping up a lot of reunited noise-rock bands, and announced plans to release a new album in 2025. Today, we know that the album is called the world is still here and so are we, and it will arrive this spring.
Mclusky are led by founding frontman Andrew Falkous, along with drummer Jack Egglestone, who joined up in 2003, and bassist Damien Sayell, who has only played in the reunited versions of teh band. Since getting back together, Mclusky have spelled their name with an asterisk, as if to distinguish between first-incarnation lineups and the current one, but they're not doing that anymore. They co-produced the world is still here and so are we with longtime collaborator Anthony Chapman, and the album includes "unpopular parts of a pig" and "the digger you deep," two of the four songs that they included on the 2023 EP mentioned above.
Along with the album announcement, Mclusky have dropped the Remy Lamont-directed video for the excellently titled new single "way of the exploding dickhead." It's a frantic riff-beast about how jerks prefer jerks for sure, and its video takes place in a nightmarish gym where one guy does an intimidating twerk routine. In a press release, Andrew Falkous says, "With a title modeled on/ripped off a formative video game (The Way Of The Exploding Fist on the ZX Spectrum), and lyrics inspired by the huge excitement caused by the surge pricing on tickets to see a band play well in the distance, ‘way of the exploding dickhead’ is a modern parable, without the parable bit." Below, check out the video, an album tracklist full of excellent song titles, and Mclusky's upcoming UK shows.
TRACKLIST:
01 "unpopular parts of a pig"
02 "cops and coppers"
03 "way of the exploding dickhead"
04 "the battle of los angelsea"
05 "people person"
06 "the competent horse thief"
07 "kafka-esque novelist franz kafka"
08 "the digger you deep"
09 "autofocus on the prime directive"
10 "not all steeplejacks"
11 "chekhov’s guns"
12 "juan party-system"
13 "hate the polis"
TOUR DATES:
5/08 - Wrexham, UK @ The Rockin' Chair
5/18 - Brussels, Belgium @ Les Nuits Botaniques *
5/23 - Manchester, UK @ Gorilla
5/24 - Leeds, UK @ Brudenell
5/29 - London, UK @ Electric Ballroom
5/31 - Bristol, UK @ SWX
the world is still here and so are we is out 5/9 on Ipecac Recordings
