“This Addic­tion” is the first album that Alkaline Trio have released since they par­ted ways with Epic Records in 2009. Now estab­lished on their own label; Heart and Skull, its clear the band have made a few changes to their sound as well…

Now before we go any fur­ther I have to explain that I approached the idea of review­ing this album the way a stray dog might approach someone offer­ing it food: I wasn’t sure if I could trust it. There was a time when I had plonked myself firmly onto the Alkaline Trio band­wagon and made myself com­fort­able. But when “Crim­son” was released in 2005 and “Mercy Me” was played on the radio on a seem­ingly con­tinu­ous loop, I politely tapped the driver on the shoulder and mumbled “erm…if you could just drop me off up here…” Since then I regarded my rela­tion­ship with A.T as a divorce in which I got to keep the posters. Sim­il­arly “Agony and Irony” enjoyed a brief flir­ta­tion with my ipod and was then swiftly forgotten.

So what about “This Addic­tion” then? Well, the obvi­ous thing to say about this album is that it has a more back-to-basics approach than pre­vi­ous albums, though not quite to the extent that I had been led to believe. This return to form could be a divid­ing prin­ciple as some fans may see it as a step back, but hon­estly, this is Alkaline Trio doing what they do best. The album focuses on a lot of the usual themes, as with earlier albums, it focuses on per­sonal exper­i­ence and it’s good to know that over the years, the band hasn’t lost its pen­chant for dark lyrics:

“I wish to dwell, I long to be
In the blood and guts, with the birds of prey and the sting­ing of bees
And bul­lets baby”

As far as the songs go its easy to see where the band have returned to their punk roots.

There’s the usual blend of three-chord riffs and rhythmic palm-muting that we’ve all grown to expect, Hang on a minute…ska? Des­pite the basic approach AT are still able to throw us a curve­ball. When the brass part of “Lead Pois­on­ing” star­ted I had to check that my CD changer hadn’t sud­denly gone hay­wire and switched over.

The most endear­ing qual­ity of Alkaline Trio was always that their songs had chor­uses more infec­tious than Avian Flu. If you play any song from “From here to Infirm­ary” to someone and ask them to sing along, chances are they’ll sit and look embar­rassed until the chorus kicks in, at which point they’ll snatch up the nearest hair­brush and croon like a drunk busi­ness­man in a karaoke bar. Hap­pily, this is a qual­ity found on “This Addic­tion”. The second track “Dine, Dine My Darling” was the main song that truly stayed with me after I’d fin­ished listen­ing to the album. “Draculina” also shows some of the old school Trio prom­ise. With that in mind though, I’m not sure why “This Addic­tion” is the title track as in my opin­ion it is far from the strongest track on the album.

It’s easy to have pre­con­cep­tions as the Trio have been around for a while now and you can be for­given for ques­tion­ing the meth­ods behind this back-to-good-ol’-goth-punk-madness, espe­cially as the years seem to have taken their toll, not least on Matt’s stead­ily reced­ing hair­line. Hav­ing said that, “This Addic­tion” is more than a placebo, and provided it goes down well on tour, it may well prove to be the fix we’re look­ing for.

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