About bloody time !

Occasional Albums Thing 079 - Vent 414 “Second”

30 years…30 freakin’ years! Jaysus, even Pink Floyd and Fleetwood Mac didn’t procrastinate that long over a follow-up album.

Noted Indie supergroup and power trio Vent 414 released their debut album in October of 1996, so we are just 5 months short of it being exactly 30 years between releases. Miles Hunt (The Wonder Stuff), Morgan Nicholls (Senseless Things, The Who, Gorillaz, The Streets, Muse) and Pete Howard (The Clash, Eat, Queen Adreena) may seem like strange bedfellows, but the noise they make together is hugely powerful, yet melodic at the same time.

It usually takes me a while to digest a new release before I can write it up for inclusion here, a couple of weeks at least, preferably longer, but on the last day of March this year I got lucky when Miles e-mailed me a link to a fully mastered streaming copy of, what he described as this “right ol’ racket”, so I’ve had the pleasure of living with "Second" for 8 and a bit weeks prior to its release last Friday. First impressions of records are important to me, and I must confess my first impression of this record was akin to “Fookin’ hell that’s bloody good”! I played it a lot and very loud in the car whilst driving around Shrewsbury emptying out my shop; I can tell you it turned some heads.

The first four tracks are quite honestly phenomenal. “Same Body Of Water”, “Infrequent”, the quite fantastic “How Far We Fell” and “No Business” are built from a concoction of shuddering riffage; bass playing the like of which we’ve not heard since the mighty John Entwhistle stalked a stage; and drumming that gives you the distinct impression that the drummer is attempting to pummel his unruly drum kit into submission, but somehow not quite managing it. It’s bloody marvellous. But it's not all "racket" and noise, they are all fantastic songs.

Miles has always had an ear for the unruly underside of music, bands like Jane’s Addiction, Shudder To Think and Shellac. There was a reason (see Shellac) that Steve Albini was bought in to record that first album. Vent 414 might be seen as Miles’ way of releasing all that pent up noise, something he couldn’t always do with The Wonder Stuff. But Vent 414’s racket is never made at the expense of the song. The, at times,  brutal musical settings are regularly wrestled under control by the most melodic of choruses. As an example, if “When Time Was On Our Side” doesn’t have you singing along at the top of your voice, punching the air and waving a lighter/mobile phone above your head you should just give up now cos there’s frankly no hope left for you. Many of you will have heard “Seconds”s lead single, “How Far We Fell”, if you haven't there's a handy link just down there at the bottom, and that manages the same balance of brutality and melody and those aren’t the only examples within, "Second" is littered with them and the album comes to a close with a song that sums it up perfectly, the confident “Hail The Empaths” with its nod to the Irish warrior Damien Dempsey.

We got a glimpse of Vent 414’s powerful live incarnation in December last year, some intense 30 minute sets opening for The Wonder Stuff, and I was really looking forward to their tour which was due to start tomorrow ! Sadly that has had to be postponed, it’s understandable, times is tuff, this album wasn’t out when the Vent 414 tour was announced. What with Miles just finishing an extensive acoustic tour and TWS embarking on a mammoth 40th anniversary jaunt around our islands the strain on the ticket budget was considerable. But let me advise you of this much…a brief glimpse into your future if you will...once you hear this beast, you won’t be able to get that ticket money out of your pockets fast enough…it’s THAT good !

How Far We Fell - https://youtu.be/MwyvGL4pRLc?si=IDHjM3FZM9WdKoUv