Dry Cleaning - Stumpwork

Released: 21/10/22

With Stumpwork, the much-anticipated follow-up to their debut, New Long Leg, Dry Cleaning have nailed it again. Where the south London quartet's first record was a masterclass in post-punk, their sophomore effort widens the pool: alongside some great alt-rock jammers, there are also tracks that mix post-punk and jangle-pop (angle-jangle?) to great effect, such as the excellent Gary Ashby', while the languorous drum-machine-and-loops opener Anna Calls from the Arctic' is a kind of cross between Luscious Jackson and Saint Etienne, and is as good as that marriage of true minds promises to be.

The excellent Sue Tompkins-fronted Scottish art-rockers Life Without Buildings are obviously a big reference point for the group, and frontwoman Florence Shaw's vocals often comes across as a more understated and deadpan version of Tompkins', but Dry Cleaning are so full of wit and invention (due in no small part to Shaw's wonderfully inventive and literary lyrics) that they easily mark out their own territory. This one's gonna be on rotation on the Dreamhouse stereo for a while yet.