Plants and Animals - The Jungle

  by Dave Goodwin

published: 30 / 10 / 2020

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Review

By way of Secret City Records and their homeland Canada come Montreal-based indie-rock outfit Plants and Animals. Featuring two members originally from Halifax, Nova Scotia, guitarist-vocalists Warren Spicer and Nic Basque are backed by drummer-vocalist Matthew Woody Woodley to form a trio who originally began playing together as kids and drifted on to the international scene in 2008. They started off with two EPs in 2003 and 2007, before they released their full-length debut ‘Parc Avenue’ in 2008 which featured string parts by Sarah Neufeld of Arcade Fire. They then released their second full offering, ‘La La Land’, in 2010, which was followed two years later by their third album, ‘The End of That’. ‘Waltzed in from the Rumbling’, their fourth full-length, came out in 2016 , and shortly afterwards ‘Passed Out from the Waltzing,’ an EP of B-sides, followed. In 2018 they released an expanded tenth anniversary edition of ‘Parc Avenue’ which brings us to this, Plants and Animals fifth album, ‘The Jungle’, a contemplative and equal affair which sees Nic singing to his teenage son who was dealing with climate change anxiety and Warren writing words to another track shortly after losing his father. Meandering through the eight tracks this outing brushes with the things we inherit not necessarily being the things we want and, let’s face it, in a broader sense, that’s where a lot of us are finding ourselves right now. In terms of sound it is reminiscent of the various stages of Arcade Fire from ‘Funeral’ through to ‘Everything’, but the lyrics reflect on the band’s own personal experiences made in these strange and volatile times. With an up-tempo electro-drum, this eclectic feast begins its journey strangely and in an offbeat way with ‘The Jungle’. Addictively it machetes its way funkily to the slower ‘Love That Boy’ until we arrive in a clearing where there is a completely engrossing Arcadian ‘House on Fire’ that will lift and throw you up into this jungle’s canopy, a canopy that you wont want to descend from. ‘Sacrifice’ is like a soundtrack from an indie-tinged Kong movie with is blasting guitars and beat changes. From here things become a little Bowie-esque with the equally brilliant ‘Get My Mind’ which features some eerie vocals. Crossing the rope bridge we encounter a Birkin-esque ‘La Queens’ drenched in jungle flavours and wade through the calmer mangroves of ‘In Your Eyes’ until we finally leave this infectious ‘Bold’ outing harking back to early Arcade.

Track Listing:-

1 The Jungle
2 Love That Boy
3 House On Fire
4 Sacrifice
5 Get My Mind
6 Le Queens
7 In Your Eyes
8 Bold

Label Links:-

https://twitter.com/secretcityrcrds
https://www.facebook.com/secretcityrec
http://www.secretcityrecords.com/
https://www.youtube.com/user/secretcit
https://plus.google.com/11235304111173