Rock And Roll Nightclub by Mac DeMarco (Album)

The Canadian songwriter channels The Smiths and Sonic Youth for this debut long-player. It’s not all late ’80s revivalism though.

In October 1988, one of that decade’s seminal bands released one of its seminal albums. With the relationship of Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore having been terminated last October, the chances of another Daydream Nation being recorded are slim to none. It’s fortunate, then, that the influence of Sonic Youth can still be keenly felt elsewhere.

Rock And Roll Nightclub is the debut release by Canadian songwriter Mac DeMarco, and whilst he may not be about to start a Teenage Riot he uses this recording to demonstrate his composed songwriting. The mood of the album is established within the opening ten seconds of its first ethereal and self-assured composition.

The songs are born of a union between Sonic Youth’s 2003 album Murray Street and the more sombre moments of The Smiths, floaty guitar lines built upon a structure of effortlessly sweet chords. It’s not all late ’80s revivalism though. Track eight, Moving Like Me, possesses an almost reggae-ike guitar line and DeMarco’s voice sounds like a marriage of Lou Reed and Ian Curtis: sombre, deep, and emanating from the mouth of a man cool enough to spend his entire life wearing obsidian sunglasses.

Rock And Roll Nightclub may not reach the excellence that Sonic Youth managed in October 1988, but Daydream Nation was that band’s seventh release. Mac DeMarco has plenty of time to journey to those heights and with this release he’s given himself a fine starting point.

Damien Girling

Out now on Captured Tracks.

To give you a taste of Rock And Roll Nightclub, here are three sample tracks:

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