Staff Reviews

Arab Strap - Philophobia (special edition)

Review by Sean Thomas

It remains completely original and rewarding 12 years on.»

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deluxe double cd version featuring the second peel session and five tracks from the band's set at t in the park in july, 1998. brooding, depressive, and morose, arab strap's music is surprisingly pretty despite itself: a dime-store drum machine thumps along in the most laconic way, a thick scottish brogue intones drunkenly and lazily above it, and a smattering of keyboard sounds and purposeful guitar chordings fall in atop that. the songs are about all the nasty women who've hurt the two young men's tortured young hearts, and it gets to be a bit much after a full hour. there are glimpses of the reasons why these two arab strap boys get into so much trouble, through their plainspoken, mumbled tales of drunkenness and copulation, but too often, 'philophobia' is the musical equivalent of an unbearable hangover suffered after a lost weekend spent behaving very badly.
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