Placebo
Loud Like Love

Led by the androgynous leader Brian Molko, Placebo are quite a peculiar animal: beloved by the public, especially the European one (especially the French), but systematically snubbed (at best) by music critics. In this 2013 rich with significant comebacks, they have reached the remarkable milestone of the seventh studio album, christened "Loud Like Love".

If the two singles chosen to preview the British trio's new effort add nothing new to the already noteworthy discography produced over the years (the title track is a melodic exercise that is now the band's trademark, while the hit "Too Many Friends" is a beautiful but didactic guitar surge enriched by an unusual piano), it is by delving into the rest of the tracklist that we find the best and most incisive elements of the new Placebo offering.

Already from "Scene Of The Crime", which starting from a classically alternative rock structure introduces successful electro tinges (almost touching dance right before the end, but without ever descending into full tackiness), Placebo tries to keep their trademark visible, making modifications or enhancements here and there to avoid becoming stagnant and thus repetitive. "Hold On To Me" is a pleasing but light "Molko-centric" ballad, while "A Million Little Pieces" (strongly a contender for release as the successor-single to "Special Needs") insists on offering a beautiful piano arrangement, perfect for launching what is ultimately the best ballad from the trio in quite some time.

The episodes where Placebo remembers loving, besides Bowie, also the Pixies and Pavement ("Rob The Bank", "Purify") are also convincing. Even the tracks that decisively move away from the territory usually frequented by the trio ("Exit Wounds", which seems to come from steroid-inflated Killers, or "Begin The End", a melancholic exercise à la Snow Patrol) don't sound like fillers, but as pieces of a coherent and inspired puzzle.

In short, Placebo is always there for us, always recognizable and inspired, this time even more compact and less sprawling than usual. The final gem "Bosco", a piano ballad interwoven with strings, is perhaps the best Placebo song from 2006 to today, and could be an excellent indication regarding the future of this band, sometimes too much disparaged and underrated.

If they have remained, and not many "little brothers" who were praised but ended up being neither fish nor fowl, there must be a reason.

Best track: Bosco