This title ain’t rhetorical.
British Sea Power employs any number of dirty tricks to get under the skin of anyone who’s enjoyed the more Anglocentric side of guitar rock in the past 20 years. And they pretty much all work. With gauzy, world-weary vocals, gritty guitars leavened by carefully textured orchestration and a detached air of grandeur, British Sea Power brings a curatorial and classicist spirit to its taste for Britpop and shoegaze. The result is a sound that is frequently reminiscent but rarely derivative. The band’s third and possibly best full-length leans in a bit harder than usual, and dazzles throughout. From the opening dirge “All In It” through the cascading rocker “Lights Out For Darker Skies” to the more Smithsy “Open the Door,” the songs pull you hard through the clouds over Brighton before the drifting edge of the dream recedes on the album’s bookend, “We Close Our Eyes.”