Margot’s new album just roadkill

As singer Richard Edwards said, the new songs on “Buzzard” are “much louder and more aggressive in general, but the quiet moments are much more bare — no strings or horns.”
 
Along with those instruments and band members, Margot and the Nuclear So & So’s have shed what made them worth hearing.

The subtlety is gone from the songs and replaced by crunchy, distorted guitar effects and dark riffs. The music is often abrasive, and the band seems to be headed closer toward the indistinguishable mainstream of alternative rock.

Awkward spoken-word introductions and fillers add to already uninteresting lyricism — one of the most disconcerting factors of the album, considering the beauty of the words in their three previous albums. Now Edwards is singing, “I like you the best, I like you the best, yes I do”, along with other nonsensical utterings in an attempt to capture that “couldn’t-care-less” rock ’n’ roll attitude.

“Buzzard” seems effortless. But in a bad way.