Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Sleater-Kinney, Milk Records/Bandcamp 2019.
A few years ago I was researching The Go-Betweens looking for their ‘Greatest Hits’, if such a thing existed, and I came across the name Sleater-Kinney.
I thought at the time that they sound like a law firm however, I soon forgot about them and moved on, that was until the name cropped up again just recently.
It turns out that they are a cutting edge feminist band from Washington, USA, and that they’ve been at the forefront of hard edged female rock for at least two and a half decades.
The band formed way back in 1994 from members of a number of bands in the riot-grrrl movement that became a key part of the American indie-rock scene.
The heart of the band is the trio of guitarist/vocalist Carrie Brownstein, vocalist/guitarist Corin Tucker and drummer Janet Weiss (who has subsequently left the band) and The Centre Won’t Hold is in a way a come-back album for them.
They went into hiatus in 2006 and reunited in 2014 and The Centre Won’t Hold is the second studio album after their restart, they released No Cities To Love in 2015.
The Centre Won’t Hold is their tenth studio album overall and it presents a dark vision of the individual trying to exist in a world of chaos.
A world where our main form of communication is via social media.
Sound familiar?
The band has labelled The Centre Won’t Hold their “midnight album on the doomsday clock.”
There is a darkness and hard electro-edge to the music which probably comes as much from their choice of producer in St. Vincent, who is the undisputed master of this genre, as it does from the content of the songs.
When you consider that the album was written before the current COVID-19 crisis the subject matter seems quite prophetic.
It’s certainly an album for our times.
St. Vincent’s influence is noticeable in the dominance of synthesisers to create an atmosphere of unease and uncertainty.
Apparently the use of this instrument is a major departure for the band, which is understandable considering their line-up of two guitars and drums.
Critics have labelled Sleater-Kinney as one of America’s best rock bands of the last two decades and if this album is anything to go by I am in complete accord with them.
By the way, their name comes from the roads near their early rehearsal space.
