The album can, in fact, be treated as a concept album about the capacity for change that lies at the heart of even the most hard-boiled and unsympathetic of men, the kind we meet straight away on âAinât Niceâ and âToadâ.
When âInto The Sunâ introduces us to a similar figure having a Damascene moment in which he realises the damage he has caused, we realise that we are, in fact, following a single flawed protagonist: an aging huckster who loves nothing but his dog, his drugs and himself. Travelling with this self-sabotaging antihero though his highs and lows, his relapses and revelations, as he rises above his basest impulses to pursue love and a life of peace is a hell of a journey in itself.
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Canada is a country that sits just north of America. They hosted the Commonwealth Games in 1994. They experience weather colder than that of Australia. It s a good country.
Kiwi Jr. are the latest reason that we re feeling appreciation for the Great White North right now. A four-piece band from Toronto that is ramshackle in all the right ways, and slick in a way that won t make you queasy. Cooler Returns is the title track from their new album – and Sub Pop debut – and it s just the kind of charming, shabby, relatable and clever indie rock song that you can fall in love with.
Kiwi Jr. - Cooler Returns (Album Review) Wednesday, 27 January 2021 Written by Huw Baines
Indie-rock is full of carefully disguised traps designed to ensnare posers and almost-there tribute acts: bands can be too clever, or too dumb, sound too much like their influences, or sound too little like themselves after a couple of records. By accident or design Kiwi Jr. stray into these crosshairs all the time, but whenever the moment to pull the trigger strikes they ricochet off into some other thing entirely.
With their second album, ‘Cooler Returns’, they prove themselves adept at evoking Jonathan Richman’s speak-sing poppiness and the antic jangle of Parquet Courts, anchoring each segue to singer Jeremy Gaudet’s slate of zingers and sharp hooks.
Reviews / / 21 · 01 · 2021
Kiwi Jr.âs self-released debut album âFootball Moneyâ arrived just last year. In our 8/10 review, we described it as
âone of those rare albums that gets better the more you play it.â Now, in keeping with the financially titled narrative of their debut, the band have coolly returned to disseminate this year s annual report to the shareholders, burying the incriminating numbers in the endless appendices of their sophomore longform record âCooler Returns.â
Having recently signed to Sub Pop (Fleet Foxes, Marika Hackman, Constantines, Nirvana), the Canadian four-piece recorded their latest work through the first stretch of quarantine last year in what they describe in a press release as a âsanitised singer shuffling to sanitised studio by streetcar flow state.â This sanitisation, thankfully, doesnât permeate through their new album; itâs crammed full of wry, observational
Features / / 19 · 01 · 2021
Melding together renowned musical influences such as The Kinks with more modern contemporaries like Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, Canada-hailing
Kiwi Jr. have garnered praise for their jangly sound, left-field observations and their firm grasp of humour they exhibit in their work. Their self-released debut album arrived just last year, but the four-piece have been hot on their heels to produce a quick follow-up.
Now signed to Sub Pop (Nirvana, Fleet Foxes, Beach House), Kiwi Jr.âs sophomore album âCooler Returnsâ will be unveiled to the world on the 22nd January. Itâs an album that allows storytelling to take centre stage as the band considers the complexity of their motivations through songs inspired from true stories as well as wider political observations. Like their debut, humour is also rife throughout and this makes for a listening experience thatâs both brisk and acutely engaging.