Last Building Burning

Seriously, these songs feel like Smashing Pumpkins demos--grainy, rough, atmospheric--like if they were made in a garage, and I think that's exactly what CN wanted to achieve. Rough, raw and rugged, but still jangly, catchy and head-poppy enough to leave you wanting more.

A raw, yet purposeful execution that never spoils his clear-headed grasp.

Clearly nobody told Cloud Nothings that album sequencing was supposed to be a dying art. Perhaps it is the satisfaction of a band returning to their natural territory, or perhaps it is a marriage of the energy of the record with the spirit of its times, but Cloud Nothings have never been better.

Last Building Burning feels like you’d hope it’d feel, as a 36-minute rush of blood to the head.

Five albums in, Cloud Nothings version of maturing is to go harder and louder than ever--and they sound all the better for it.

Last Building Burning is Cloud Nothings embracing a harsher component to their sound--almost recalling the likes of recent Oh Sees releases--which has grown into something unsettled, bold and reckless.

It's a rare moment of ambitious sprawl in an album that's otherwise lean, loud, and a no-nonsense celebration of Cloud Nothings' strengths.

On their pressure cooker of a fifth album, Last Building Burning, they rebound with a magnificent course correction. Volume and fury? Sure, they can do that. Still, they meet the demand with almost passive-aggressive relish.

A ferocious album that finds them diving headfirst into experimentation, it is filled to the brim with a driving energy that rarely lets up. Striking the precarious balance of melding their pop inclinations with uproarious noise, Cloud Nothings push the dial back in the right direction.

By setting its course in the equal and opposite direction of Life Without Sound, it becomes its evil twin, a still-incomplete picture of Cloud Nothings. ... Yet Last Building Burning feels like a triumphant return because there isn’t as much pressure on it to do or say anything beyond its purely utilitarian aims. It slaps, shreds, and whips ass in whatever way you see fit.

On Last Building Burning, Cloud Nothings provide their take on a stripped back album. Belts were loosed, fingers bled, and there was probably some howling at the moon. But in a world so interconnected, you can’t forget the primal that’s in you still trying to make sense of it all- knowing a starry sky is the back drop to honeymooners and prisoners.