Placebo
Placebo RE:CREATED
Elevator Lady Ltd / AWAL
How do you make a perfect album better? That’s not a preamble to a tasteless joke, but rather a legitimate concern. When Placebo released their eponymously titled debut album in 1996, it arrived fully formed and laden with promise. While the band would refine their sound and songwriting, releasing equally inventive work, nothing captured the spiky, edgy essence of Placebo. Fans of the original album needn’t worry, there’s been no radical overhaul of treasured tracks like amphetamine-fuelled opener ‘Come Home’, yet they are no mere facsimiles, either. Rather, RE:CREATED finds the band reworking and embellishing these songs with the experience they’ve gained in the preceding three decades, bringing wiser heads to familiar themes, finds past and present colliding at that sweet spot somewhere in between. What today’s Placebo bring to this project is bravery, not so much in revisiting classic tunes, but confidence; whereas Placebo once sounded slightly tentative, RE:CREATED is more assertive, and by extension, that has changed the dynamic of tracks like ‘Nancy Boy’. Yet, it’s essentially the same piece of ear candy, the chorus of which you’ll still find yourself singing at the most inappropriate moments. Dragging the past into the present, RE:CREATED has closed Placebo’s circle.
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Review by Peter Dennis