Anybody who has seen Dig!, the 2004 documentary about The Brian Jonestown Massacre and The Dandy Warhols, would not have put their pocket money on Anton Newcombe’s mob still being around and making music 19 years later, such was the erratic behaviour of the singer. Not only is Newcombe still around, he’s putting out some pretty decent music too.

The Future Is Your Past, a phenomenal 20th album in a madcap career, may not win any awards, but there’s a lot to admire, including the earworm melody of the proggy ‘Nothing Can Stop The Sound’; mid-paced toe-tapper ‘As The Carousel Swings’; and the hypnotic ‘Stuck To Yous’.

At their best, like the chugging guitars of ‘The Light Is About To Change’, BJM resemble a lower-fi War On Drugs. Most of the time, though, they don’t have anything like the hooks of Adam Granduciel’s compositions, and Newcombe’s vocals are frequently buried too deep in the mix, as on ‘Fudge’ and ‘The Mother Of All Fuckers’.

The meandering ‘Cross Eyed Gods’ is all a little too Morrissey-esque in terms of melodrama; that sort of thing was all well and good when you were in your early 20s, Anton, but feels a little embarrassing at 55. Not that he’ll care a jot, of course.

Overall, Future Is Your Past still makes for a decent return.

Key track: ‘The Light Is About To Change’
Score: 7

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