Wild Beasts - Present Tense

Nice boys you could bring home to mum – assuming she was not too well-versed with their transcendentally pervy lyrics – Wild Beasts found themselves at the centre of a surprise furore when lead singer Hayden Thorpe went on somewhat of a rant about British bands affecting Americanisms. Quicker than you could shout ‘media stitch-up’, his comments were reported as an attack on Arctic Monkeys. Even as you read this, the kerfuffle is ongoing across the water.

Such excitement, it is a pleasure to report, has absolutely zero bearing on the group’s fourth album, a collection of disembodied synth pieces that represents a stark break from their Cocteau Twins-esque earlier output. They’ve found a way to move on from 2012’s Smother – 40 minutes of ambient art pop so perfect you wondered how it could possibly be bettered.

The catchiest moment here is single ‘Wanderlust’, a frosty electro rocker that feels like Antony and the Johnsons cross-pollinated with Depeche Mode: Thorpe sings like a little boy who has seen awful things as electro beats throb in the background.

Under their wispy exterior, Wild Beasts’ music has been deeply psychosexual and the obsession with flesh and hormones continues. The narrator of ‘Nature Boy’ appears to be addressing a husband he recently cuckolded while the vocal interplay between Thorpe and bassist Tom Fleming burbles with a tension that verges on the physical (the group seem more interested in sexual ambivalence than most English bands). Stark, dark, often lost in a fever dream, Present Tense is the sort of LP it’s easy to believe UK rock bands had forgotten how to make.

Out February 21.