THE MINUS 5 – KILLINGSWORTH

“They’ll mess you up just like a feudal lord / Oh you’ve never seen such a smorgasbord…the disembowlers”.  The Minus 5’s started life as one of those side-projects, a project now eight albums old and at least on parity with the “day jobs” of it’s two main-men, Fresh Young Fellow’s Scott McCaughey and REM’s Peter Buck. Killingsworth – and McCaughey particular lyric slant – are open for all to see in the song titles, The Disembowlers, The Dark Hand of Contagion, The Lurking Barrister, Scott Walker’s Fault and I Would Rather Sacrifice You – “I would rather sacrifice you than to miss sweet Jesus call”. McCaughey’s bitter-sweet pop melodies are all the sweeter this time around for the backing ministrations of the She Bee Gees, and the Buck’s touches are subtle via pedal-steel and mandolin (pick the Losing My religion touches on Ambulance Dancehall) as well as guitar. The tunes on Killingsworth are verging more on Gram Parsons-esque country-pop than anything else, the Scott Walker reference a dead giveaway.Perhaps McCaughey could cheer up, but with those gorgeous melodies you tend to want to forgive him and small slips into maudlin.

*** 1/2