It brings me great pleasure to report that our permanently miserable chums, those lovable Tindersticks have lightened up somewhat. On a couple of tracks, on this their fifth and finest studio album, singer Stuart Staples doesn't actually sound like he's mumbling through the pain of all too recent root canal treatment. He sounds like he's looking up at the sky rather than down at the fag ends. And on one track there's a beat. Well, a pulse, sort of, like a coma victim not exactly coming round as such but momentarily raising a limp left finger in recognition of the exterior world.
After a disagreeable period at the end of the 90s when the band appeared to be treading water and becoming a cliche of themselves 'Can Our Love… marks a welcome step forward. It begins in familiar territory, 'Dyin Slowly' is such a typically cheery song title and as you would imagine it's a suitable sombre late night skulk around the fire escape of the soul, momentarily lifted by a sweeping string arrangement and a teasingly brief mood lifting melody.
The second track, is the real corker, hinting at a shared record collection that extends beyond the land of hi fi crooners and lo fi losers and a hitherto unexplored Stax influence. 'People Keep Comin' Around' positively struts and prowls, one can almost imagine Staples breaking into a shimmy. Marvellous and even though it clocks in at over seven minutes long it ends way too soon. Bit like the album as a whole really, just eight tracks that leave you wanting more. Later, on the Al Green inspired title track -a sparse arrangement built around a rich reverb- ushers in the Tindersticks singer at his most bare and exposed, the resulting ballad could bring a tear to a glass eye. Well, after a few whiskies and a well targeted water pistol.
Then there's 'No Man In The World' with a guitar sound so drenched in early morning sunlight not even a song that sounds like the ghostly regrets of a dead father can quell. Honest.
Tindersticks remain locked in a dark forgotten basement with damp peeling the paper off the walls and woodlice trundling across the musty carpets. Thankfully for us and them someone's pulled the curtains open a little.
