Buy Now
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
-
Mar 28, 2014Even if it's not quite as striking an achievement as WIXIW, it's a lot of fun and shows, once again, that Liars are unquestionably themselves no matter how much they push their boundaries.
-
Mar 24, 2014As enjoyable as it can be, Mess is a centrist record from a band without a lot of centrist strengths and appreciating it can feel like a symbolic gesture.
-
UncutMar 14, 2014Analogue synths and electronic drums combine with distorted tribal chants to darkly compelling effect. [Apr 2014, P.77]
-
Mar 25, 2014They’ve created what is without a doubt their least innovative and least gloriously messy album. It’s a testament to the sturdy identity underneath the surface that the result is great nonetheless.
-
MojoMar 21, 2014Mess's crepuscular predecessor felt both more innovative, and more likely to open up Liars' demographic. [Apr 2014, p.92]
-
Q MagazineMar 14, 2014Liars' untidy room remains a wonderful place to visit. [Apr 2014, p.113]
-
Mar 24, 2014Mess’ is characterised by synths and distorted beats. But unlike the often self-doubting and timid ‘WIXIW’, it revels in its own demented chaos.
-
Apr 4, 2014Here, they reach for a macabre death-disco vibe.
-
Mar 18, 2014This is undoubtedly Liars’ most engaging work, and certainly the best Mute album since, well, WIXIW.
-
Under The RadarMar 14, 2014The kind of envelope-pushing on Mess is nothing if not mature, simultaneously punk as fuck and utterly refined. [Feb/Mar 2014, p.72]
-
Mar 24, 2014As with their previous six albums, Liars find a way to both innovate and deliver a brand-loyal effort with (dis)ease.
-
Mar 19, 2014Being a Liars album, it is magnificent.
-
Mar 25, 2014More than anything, Mess is impactful commentary about the contemporary tendency to consume culture passively.
-
Apr 7, 2014Its lyrics, though often hard to discern in the mumbles, start to get to the core of what Mess is all about--trying to find some sort of peace in this anxiety-breeding world.
-
Mar 28, 2014Mess is characteristically confident and brash, but humane and enduring. In short, it’s up there with the rest of their unerringly brilliant back-catalogue.
-
Mar 25, 2014Its coda features a lone, breathy synth that unfurls like a tattered flag planted high atop a snow-covered peak, and, like the band’s best work, the song is comparable to little else in the pop/indie landscape—a far cry from the tepid feel that permeates too much of this Mess.
-
Mar 27, 2014Mess gets caught in an odd trap in that it’s neither patient nor nimble.
-
Mar 14, 2014Another ambitious statement from a band that has made a habit of reinventing themselves at every stage, while still, somehow, sounding uniquely like Liars.
-
Mar 24, 2014It's another welcome reversal for a band that, while keeping true to the same program of intense macabre album after album, keeps finding new ways to vary their ominous approach.
-
Mar 20, 2014With overwhelming confidence the Brooklyn-based trio present 11 songs of unerring quality and an almost uncountable numbers of flicks and tricks.
-
Apr 14, 2014They’re still nodding to early Pop synthesizer proponents (The Human League, Fad Gadget, A Broken Frame era Depeche Mode), and now mixing in a beefed-up, contemporary EDM blast with the je ne sais quoi that the group infuses into everything it touches.
-
Mar 26, 2014Their meh generation, “shouting lager lager” take on four-on-the-floor energy is starting to wear a bit thin.
-
Mar 27, 2014The album feels less ponderous and more balls-out than its predecessor, but the band hasn’t stitched up its maniacal tendencies into commercial pop either.
-
Mar 24, 2014Now seven albums deep into their career, Liars remain a lasting and distinguished presence, one that continues to question the confinement of genre and fashions their identity around a refusal to do so.
-
The WireMar 28, 2014Mess is more immediate than the past couple of albums, and in context, more baffling. [Mar 2014, p.63]
-
MagnetApr 18, 2014The alterations and differences may be slighter and more comparable to alt-music's lexicon, but that's bound to happen after a decade and a half. Still, the redefinition continues, and so does the compelling art. [No. 108, p.51]
-
Mar 21, 2014As much as Mess is a drive further across electronic borders Liars explored in 2012 with WIXIW, it is simultaneously a consolidation of all that has come before.
-
Mar 25, 2014The group deftly submits to the forms and tropes of electro-pop and vintage EBM.
-
May 1, 2014For a group that's never settled down, Mess could be described as Liars' comfort zone.
-
Mar 31, 2014The pace rarely drops and, at points, the noise and structure is, indeed, messy, but the whole is punka focused collection with a bloody-minded, if also bloody-nosed, vision throughout.
-
Mar 25, 2014Where WIXIW was the intricately ordered product of a hundred thousand small decisions, Mess is a sloppy, outward-turned--and, it has to be said, uneven--quagmire built with the kind of swagger that dares you to use its own title against it.
-
Mar 14, 2014Uniquely with Mess, they've instead dealt with the most colossal environment, making a grander statement about the aphotic bleakness of society in the process
-
Apr 30, 2014All of Mess has an enjoyably menacing feel that will prove inviting to Liars fans and new listeners alike.
-
Mar 24, 2014Liars revel in keeping their listeners on edge and entertained making Mess their most wickedly enjoyable album yet.
-
Mar 25, 2014As the trio continue to remould and refine their craft, Mess, an album fuelled by impulse, demonstrates their ideological core hasn’t moved an inch.
-
Mar 25, 2014Sonically, the capricious trio has brought about a fresh positive energy while still delving into the darkness that has always been present throughout their career.
-
Mar 26, 2014On Mess, surface is meaning, with the album’s vacuous hedonism merely another expression of the theme of spiritual oblivion that Liars have explored ever since their debut.
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 29 out of 38
-
Mixed: 8 out of 38
-
Negative: 1 out of 38
-
Mar 26, 2014
-
Jan 2, 2016
-
Jun 24, 2014