Credible contemporary albums by survivors of Punk’s first wave are thin on the ground these days and new releases by most hoary old codgers from the summer of ’77 are liable to provoke anything from derision to embarrassment.
TV SMITH, though, was always a sharp geezer, and his lyrical adroitness usually ensures that – while his profile is considerably lower than it was during The Adverts’ turbulent couple of years sniffing around TOTP – he remains a voice of concern and angry eloquence squalling in from the wilderness whenever a recording budget rears its’ head.
And in recent years, TV’S career has undergone something of a resurgence. An internet-only anti-war single “Not In My Name” (2003) received a record 7,000 downloads while his last album “Not A Bad Day” reminded many that not only was he still active out there, but that he had plenty to say we should be paying attention to.
The good news is that new album “Misinformation Overload” continues this trend. Recorded with long-term acolytes Jon Caffery (keyboards/ production), bassist Happi Mueller and Die Toten Hosen drummer Vom Ritchie, it’s an old-fashioned, social-commentary-fuelled punk rock album with an enviously good cache of decent tunes and anthemic choruses you can’t help but get snagged upon.
Opener “Good Times Are Back” is both vintage TV and a great start. It’s a powerful and revved-to-glory the-more-times-change-the-more-they-stay-the-same anthem culminating in Smith bemoaning “was it ever better than it is now? I need to know/ but all I get is muzak and a voice that says “please hold!” while the band put the boot in in no uncertain terms.
And it’s a credit to them that they rarely ease off after this. Songs like the deceptively bouncy power pop of the bitter “Second Class Citizens” (“so we zipped out lips and aimed ever lower but still missed/ in this compassionate land, the helping hand shows you two fingers then a fist”) and the neat, game show mentality commentary of “Right Hands Rise” demonstrate that Smith remains capable of coating a convincingly poisonous lyrical pill; “You Saved My Life Then Ruined It” sports a Morrissey-esque title, annoyingly catchy carnival keyboards and could easily be a single and “Small Rewards” throws in some unexpected piano and baritone guitar and is surprisingly epic in design.
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Happily, he leaves the best until last and “Carrying On”, where – over an infectious reggae-rock lope - an older and wiser TV notes “things are looking up, we’ve landed the right way up/ there’s a gift that troubles bring that’s a wonderful thing” with all the defiance and invincibility of someone who’s been nutmegged, mugged and been through the mill of life on more than the odd occasion. It’s a survivor’s blues of some repute and surely destined to be a live favourite for years to come.
OK, everything’s relative and it’s hard to imagine “Misinformation Overload” making the same kind of splash TV Smith made back in the day. Nonetheless, it reminds us there’s much more to this singular character than simply endless re-moulds of “Gary Gilmore’s Eyes” and proves that a few of the old guard can still give the young pups a run for the easily-earned filthy lucre when they get the opportunity. Heartening stuff.
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