Review Summary: I wanna show you it's cool to grow up
On their 2016 debut Leave Me Alone, Madrid rockers Hinds warped sketchy guitars with catchy, rowdy melodies, split between its pair of vocalists, Carlotta Cosials and Ana Garcia Perrote. As a result, the album almost rode on its blemishes—the two’s vocals worked within the sound the band emitted, a resounding and then playful twist on garage-rock. You can say nearly the same thing about their latest offering, I Don’t Run. Gordon Raphael, who worked on the Strokes’ first two albums as producer, teams up with the band for another easy-going record that carries the same vibes as their debut, with even an extra dash of improvement in places.
The band bring double the energy in some songs, and then leaves it out in others, mostly for good measure. On lead single “New For You”, the catchiest thing on the record, the band capture a rowdy piece of infectious indie rock—the coupled vocals from Cosials and Perrote in the chorus compliment the uproarious fun that the track bleeds. It’s a fearless and self-assured song, much like a number of others on the record, but here, it’s almost an in-the-moment type of tenacity, a feeling that you can only get after being on an elated high. “Tester” is another track brimming with energy and fun, also highlighting the amiable chemistry that the band share—the kind that leaps out of their music and onto listeners. It features a fast and perfectly wild chorus—”you can prove me wrong/but when I’m alone I feel like I’m your tester,”—and even dips into a pure and different rock n’ roll sound when the track slows things down three quarters into it.
Their lyrics have never been the band’s strongest suit, and yet, here, songs are more honest compared to their debut. Speaking to The Fader, Cosials said “when we sat down to write the lyrics, we decided to get more naked. Let’s face it, nobody reads the lyrics anyway. So for this album, we said, let’s speak clearly.” Verses like, “I am touching without hands because you’re deaf and blind”, are exchanged for lyrics like, “sometimes a short trip to hell can dry an ocean”, which is almost a treasure to hear. On opening track “The Club”, their most Strokes sounding track yet, the band capture a newfound relationship struck inside a party, and inside the significant other who isn’t interested in any more of it. Cosials said “the song comes out from the darkest side of the nights of Madrid”. There’s a heartsick vibe that accompanies the upbeat instrument and addicting hook, much like the album’s entirety. “Ma Nuit” is probably the saddest sounding song that the group have accomplished, even if it doesn’t serve as the best album closer. However, the sparse air the track emits, along with its Spanish flavor, does shed a different, vulnerable light on the band.
Even if things have improved with the album, there are things that haven’t—most notably the lack of the band’s change in sound. Two years have past and most of these songs could have easily been chucked on their debut, despite that album having the catchier set of sounds and melodies. Yet, the records are so close in quality that its rather all right. I Don’t Run shares the same amount of energy and summer-rock clangs, enough to make it an almost better collection when paired with its enhanced songwriting. Where Leave Me Alone was mostly about the party, I Don’t Run almost feels like the result of confronting more rooted emotions after it comes to an end.
