Description
A pivotal record for contemporary times; bright, free, adamant, optimistic. Brain Worms is RVGs fullest, most pristine album yet.
All throughout Brain Worms, its apparent that this is a band in very fine form. Album opener Common Ground sets the tone for whats to come; a shiny, thrilling, punch of an album, with all the beloved RVG hallmarks. Vagers voice is unfiltered and commanding as ever when delivering her clever, not-quite-ironic lyrics. Here, though, those lyrics feel so much less resigned to yearning, and so much more defiant and joyous.
Tambourine is the only Covid song Vager wrote when trying not to write Covid songs, and its a painfully honest portrait of grieving mid-isolation. Brain Worms tells the all-too-familiar story of a person falling down the internet rabbit hole and finding comfort in conspiracies. Nothing Really Changes is a keys-heavy new wave-ish thing, while closer Tropic of Cancer sparkles with Vagers self-assured new manifesto: I know what Im like, and I know how I get. If you think Im strange, you aint seen nothin yet.
Bloxham, Nolte, and Wallace are flawlessly adept in bringing Vagers songwriting to life. Recorded in London at Snap Studios with James Trevascus (Nick Cave & Warren Ellis, PJ Harvey), all ten tracks surge with lush sounds and clear intentions and the magic of an acoustic guitar once owned by Kate Bush, given to her by Tears for Fears (who, legend has it, wrote Everybody Wants to Rule the World on it).
Between the four bandmates lead singer and guitarist Vager, guitarist Reuben Bloxham, drummer Marc Nolte and bassist Isabele Wallace this is the most confident theyve ever felt in RVG. Theyve moved past their influences, pushed themselves, and tried new things. And they have made a record they can, by all accounts, call their best.
Brain Worms feels like the antithesis to what a post-pandemic record could easily be. For a band who were already writing music about being reclusive we were depressed and not going outside on our first two albums the enforced isolation and time to think gave Vager space to write about anything she wanted. And, it turned out, she was ready to write about acceptance.
If we could only make one more album, it would be this one, says Vager.
Easily one of the most vital bands on the Aussie scene today Rolling Stone
A calling card for outsiders dynamic and vital post-punk The Guardian
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