You can do a lot of growing up in two years. If you’re in your mid-twenties and trying to find your identity, you can easily become a a radically different person. For Torres, aka Nashville singer-songwriter Mackenzie Scott, the question pertaining to the follow-up to her self-titled 2013 album was just how a voice so mature and so world-weary could grow – when you already sound wise before your years, how do you demonstrate you’ve grown?
Based on Sprinter, the immediate answer is: you don’t. Torres has swapped the intimate hushed ambience of her debut for a richer, full-blooded rock sound. If her debut was Cat Power then this is PJ Harvey – an much more aggressive and raw take on that style of troubled indie performer. It is in fact Harvey’s backing musicians fleshing out her band – Ian Olliver and Robert Ellis lending their talents to support Scott’s scrappy strumming and finger-picked melodies, which was recorded at the studio of Adrian Utley, best known for his work with Portishead and Goldfrapp.
Does it work? Yes, and no. These new songs see Scott unleash her anger and address those around her with a snarling fury that requires the sonics of a full band – crashing, pounding drums, grinding electric guitars and squalls of feedback, all backgrounded with moody synth tones which animate Scott’s new-found disdain and confidence. Sprinter‘s best sound is still Scott’s throaty bellow, which conveys anguish and misery as well as it does frustration, and the noisy, rock sound is a perfect match for a sense of primality. Opening track ‘Strange Hellos‘ sounds incredible, with flat strums and oblique lyrics giving way to the kind of raucous chorus that bands are still trying to master twenty-five years after ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit,’ while ‘New Skin’ struts at the pace of a grunge ballad while Scott channels her best Billy Corgan sneer.
But while Sprinter sounds great, it loses the unique appeal of Torres’ prior career. The strongest songs on her debut album sounded like stadium rock played to an audience of one, with guitar dynamics alone supporting the rich holler of Scott’s voice, piercing the listener with delicate self-truths while sounding grand. But chunks of Sprinter sound like Torres not knowing what to do with a full-band and relying on cliches. The quiet-loud choruses feel like shorthand for better-written songs that Scott is easily capable of, and the irony is that the songs which seem most designed as anthems are the ones which feel most distant.
That isn’t to say that Sprinter is all power-chords and no dynamism. There’s moments of idiosyncracity which show Torres as distinct from her contemporaries. ‘Cowboy Guilt’, which is comparatively short compared to five-minute runtime of most of these songs, is built on a wobbly live-sounding drum machine groove while Scott alternates between pseudo-sweetness and derision over a conventional country riff. The album’s highlight is ‘Son, You Are No Island’, an admonishment of male ego over a brooding synth and stark guitar. It’s the most minimal and striking moment of the album.
Sprinter’s flaw is its refusal to let loose Torres’ personality. The last three songs are traditional indie-rock ballads, the kind that Sharon Van Etten has won critical acclaim for while sounding like Torres and Cat Power. But on her debut release Scott sang in broad strokes on themes of loneliness and fear, taking the most private of feelings and making them seem universal, whereas here the noisy rock songs don’t say enough to work beyond being noisy rock songs. Scott has switched from writing stadium-sized lyrics and playing them on a lonely guitar, to performing stadium-reaching music that’s lost some of its universal reach.
Sprinter isn’t a failure or even a mis-step – it’s a solid album full of big choruses and clever lines, with arresting moments and curious production in parts. It sounds like the past few years have developed her as an artist – both in terms of strength and self-belief as well as into a powerful performer. It’s just frustrating that youth sounded so much more vital.
[Rating:3.5]
