Kasabian- 'For Crying Out Loud' Album Review

Kasabian- ‘For Crying Out Loud’

Kasabian are an interesting band when you think about it. 5 albums in now and each one has reached number one in the charts, they go on regular sold-out arena tours and are consistent festival headliner acts. Yet, in my opinion, they haven’t really produced a memorable album since 2009 album ‘West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum’, yes they’ve had a few catchy songs since then, but no full project that has really been worth remembering. And now, in 2017, the Leicester and proud lads are back with their latest studio album ‘For Crying Out Loud’, so let’s see if it’s up there with their 2009 quality.

After first listen, the short answer is no. ‘For Crying Out Loud’ is an album that has a few standout songs but the majority seems to simply serve as filler in order to give it a respectable total length time of 55 minutes. One of the few credible tracks from this record is the album’s opener ‘Ill Ray (The King)’, it’s a punchy, fast paced proper rock-anthem that fills the listener with hope for the rest of this record. Sadly however this hope is swiftly diminished by tracks like ‘Twentyfourseven’ and ‘Good Fight’ which serve little purpose to the overall quality of ‘For Crying Out Loud’. I’m well aware that Kasabian have never been renowned for their lyrical ability but words like “She don't like the sun; She love the rain; Let it pour on everyone; She don’t want it said; She want it explained” on ‘Good Fight’ are lazy and lacklustre. ‘Are You Looking For Action?’ is far too long and doesn’t really go anywhere, whilst ‘Bless This Acid House’ is as embarrassing as its title.

Stadium anthems like ‘You’re In Love with a Psycho’ & ‘Comeback Kid’ draw you in via their catchy, infectious nature which enables ‘For Crying Out Loud’ to appear much more reliable. You can certainly imagine these particular tracks being belted out by 80,000 people at Glastonbury, and this is something that Kasabian have always done well. They’ve always had a consistent nature of producing catchy rock songs that are just slightly too edgy to be classed as mainstream, therefore enabling them to stay at the top of their genre in terms of popularity, but maybe not in terms of musical quality. Kasabian also have a huge fan base that mainly consists of football fans as their type of music appeals to those types of people and I’m sure that ‘For Crying Out Loud’ will have them all putting on their Stone Island jackets and Adidas Gazelles in order to get to the front of their gigs, no matter how poor this album may be.

With every Kasabian record you have to ask yourself, are there enough bangers on this album to make you forget about the filler tracks and with ‘For Crying Out Loud’ they have unfortunately fallen short of the mark.

Overall Rating- 6/10

Fave Tracks- ‘Ill Ray (The King)’, ‘You’re In Love With A Psycho’, ‘Sixteen Blocks’

Least Fave Tracks- ‘Twentyfourseven’, ‘Good Fight’, ‘Are You Looking For Action?’, ‘Put Your Life On It’