Album Review: Django Django – 'Glowing In The Dark'

Returning three years after their ecstatically-received 2018 record Marble Skies, British art-rock stars Django Django are fixing to bring the house down with Glowing In The Dark.

The London foursome have proven that they truly have their musical wits about them this time. Although some might call their mad-scientist-like fusion of genres confusing, their fourth record is actually quite coherent – in a weirdly wonderful sort of way.

Opening with characteristic prog-rock-indie number ‘Spirals’, Glowing In The Dark jumps from space disco to surf rock to the titular track’s breakbeat-by-way-of-house energy. Charlotte Gainsbourg’s vocal on ‘Waking Up’ lends gravitas, while ‘Night Of The Buffalo’s’ cinematic, orchestral strings give way to folk-blues ditty ‘The World Will Turn’, offering a bit of respite from the album's more intense moments.

Glowing is delightfully anti-pandemic, a true reason to be cheerful. This is art for art’s sake, an album that revels in fitting music from completely different eras together like puzzle pieces. You’ll find little talk of politics here (although perhaps making a revelatory work in a time such as this is, in itself, a political act). The record is a sign of maturity – Django Django aren’t trying to be anything more than exactly what they are, and they have (finally, some will say), learned how to organise the chaos of their influences into a true masterwork.

• 8/10

Listen to the album below.