While they have always been a politically aware band, Maximo Park’s indie-rock indignation is most obvious on their sixth album.
Risk to Exist is essentially their Brexit record as frontman Paul Smith takes aim at the out-of-touch elite (Leave voters who made up the majority in his native Teesside get off lightly).
Like Paul Weller’s Style Council songs, the serious message is made more palatable by some sleek touches. What Did We Do to You to Deserve This? employs restrained funk and clipped guitars as a despairing Smith relives the referendum campaign.
On I’ll Be Around he merges the personal and political amid a lovely, spacious arrangement featuring synths and a horn section.
But Maximo Park are guilty of their own core vote strategy on the album’s familiar, bristling indie tunes.
(Cooking Vinyl)
