Predicting what will come next from Liars has become an almost impossible task over the years. The New York outfit are now ten albums and more than twenty years into a career that still refuses to be easily labelled. Their back catalogue has taken in everything from the punk sound that influenced their early releases to funk, electronica, dance and rock. They’ve been through personnel changes – founding member Aaron Hemphill in 2017, and drummer Julian Gross three years earlier – and yet continually refused to stand still.

Amid all the change, the one constant has remained Angus Andrew, the captivating frontman who, with no bandmates in the Liars lineup at the time, wrote, recorded and released their last two albums (2017’s TFCF and Titles With The Word Fountain a year later) virtually solo. For new album The Apple Drop though, Andrew has brought drummer Laurence Pyke and multi-instrumentalist Cameron Deyell into the fold. Andrew’s wife Mary Pearson Andrew also contributed lyrics for the album. 

So what version of Liars does The Apple Drop signify? Well, opening track The Start is a gritty signal, fusing big drums, hazy industrial elements and sci-fi sound effects to create an oddly spacey but deeply intriguing affair. That sound carries into Slow And Turn Inward, which is a more stripped back counterpart, while Sekwar builds from a slow start into a crashing, spiralling outro.

Big Appetite is a monster, a brooding rock number that is so much more than the sum of its many, many components, while Star Search is equally enormous in scope, a burning sun at the heart of the album, and a track that packs an absolutely dizzying amount into it’s sub four-minute run time, and feels like a sort of hyper-focused Muse with any unnecessary pomp pruned. Elsewhere, My Pulse To Ponder thumps along, King Of The Crooks has a ghostly vibe, and Acid Crop is a suitably epic finale.

Andrew has clearly found strength in numbers again for The Apple Drop, a stunning listen that manages to be yet another twist in their tale, yet somehow still quintessentially a Liars record.

The Apple Drop tracklist:

1. The Start
2. Slow And Turn Inward
3. Sekwar
4. Big Appetite
5. From What The Never Was
6. Star Search
7. My Pulse To Ponder
8. Leisure War
9. King Of The Crooks
10. Acid Crop

Watch the official video for Big Appetite here.

Author: Joe Sharratt

Joe Sharratt is a writer and journalist based in the UK covering music, literature, sport, and travel.