Dinosaur Pile-Up - I've Felt Better (Mascot 
Records)
Release Date: Out Now
Here we go then, this is it. The comeback album from the indomitable Dinosaur Pile-Up, are you ready? 'I've Felt Better' bursts into the room with opening track ''Bout To Lose It' which pummels you with drums, riffage and desperate vocals. Well, what did you expect? Europop? 'Title track 'I've Felt Better' stands firmly in the US grunge lane but with the dryness of an English sensibility covering life-threatening illness with a shrug, a riff and a casual reference to being "a little bit under the weather". The rage and speed continues on 'Punk Kiss' which is fo sho going to be a live favourite while 'Sick Of Being Down' is an anthem for the long term sick who just want to break out of their funk and rock out but the meds and/or their condition won't let them.
Former single 'My Way' (not that one) see frontman Matt Bigland roll out his rap chops again on another anthem of breaking the mould and backing your own individuality even if it doesn't translate into commercial success (literal and figurative music to the ears of a blogger who makes no dollar from this game). 'Big Dogs' is a chugging beast of a song with a dead-eyed vocals that will unsettle even the most hardest of souls while 'Big You And Me' sounds like Reuben if they'd grown up in the suburbs of SoCal with a loose bass line and a groove bigger than the Grand Canyon.
The release of energy on this album after such an enforced break from creativity is delicious but there is a drop down on 'Love's The Worst' until the chorus comes and slaps you round the face with a flying-V. If there was an award for Song Title of the Year then 'Quasimodo Melonheart' would be a strong contender but it's also a brilliantly vulnerable love song set to a bouncing grunge-pop melody. The initial acoustic strum of 'Sunflower' takes me back to the mid-90s (maybe a little taste of Blind Melon) before the chorus kicks in and we're off on a road-trip in the sunshine to create havoc in a field somewhere.
It would have so easy for this album to be an introspective pity-party after all of Bigland's health issues but the guts to come out swinging with the band still intact is encapsulated on the euphoric and anthemic 'Unfamiliar' - "I'm ill, maybe I'll get my changed, I take pills, yeah maybe I'm a little insane". The album closes out on 'I Don't Love Nothing And Nothing Loves Me', a pure release of energy that comes from accepting the darkest moments of your life and knowing that you can move forwards from those and into something better. If you're struggling right now or have ever struggled then this album is for you. If you haven't struggled then kudos to you but you can still enjoy this record because it's a fucking blast and everyone can get turned on by that, can't they?
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