In an adjoining dimension, Sack are so successful that they’re fleecing fans with dynamically priced stadium reunions. Why that didn’t happen in this dimension, too – given that the English press heralded their 1994 song What Did the Christians Ever Do for Us?, their album Butterfly Effect, from 1997, is an indie-pop classic, and they enjoyed Morrissey’s patronage back when that was desirable – is an unanswerable, how-long-is-a-piece-of-string conundrum.
Sensibly, those involved in the Dublin band got on with life, but in recent years they’ve been playing live, too, and seem to have been enjoying themselves, accepting greatness as its own reward. Now they’ve rewarded us with their best record.
The pop perfection of the singles that have preceded it set out Sack’s stall in fine fashion. What a Way to Live, from 2021, is a worthy inclusion, as the wheels are still spinning “to drive a nation off a cliff”. Do You Need Love? eulogises the “shot in the dark” of human connection, with Martin McCann, the Finglas Sinatra, deftly delivering the heart-on-sleeve lyrics of the guitarist John Brereton. And the people-have-the-power title track has yet another chorus as tall as Liberty Hall.
The rest is possibly even better. The album’s opening track, I Fell Through a Crack, sports a brilliant Brereton lyric, referencing both educational streaming and the van crash that nearly killed him back in the 1980s, powered by his brother Tony’s drumming and the Peter Hook-channelling bass of Gavin Fox. Its closing track, Blood and Boundaries, has Renaissance man McCann – singer, painter, actor, juggler (probably) – crooning beautifully about love’s vagaries over acoustic guitar and cello.
At every turn in between, the arrangements – from Johnny Marr-like guitar to perfectly placed backing vocals and keyboards to the sexy, swampy groove of Kingsize – are inventive, the production is robust enough to jack up a truck, Brereton and McCann’s lyrics are evocative and sharp, and the melodies sear into the brain. The wham-bam-glam cover art is this year’s best too.
“Once in a while, along comes a thrill,” McCann declares. Well, here it is. Don’t let it pass you by. Again.
