The Drones
Havilah

"Havilah" (’08, ATP Recordings) is the result of a self-imposed exile in a rustic cottage in the heart of the Australian desert. It is an album that marks the abandonment of the raucous and aggressive sounds that permeated their previous works, especially “Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By” and “Gala Mill”, that reeked too much of Bad Seeds and, above all, of Crazy Horse.
Frontman Gareth Libbard, the creative pivot of the group, is no longer one of Neil Young's innumerable nephews, though he retains the occasionally indolent and lazy voice. Instead, to sing his blues and fight his ghosts, he opts for a more languid and visceral songwriting. Despite the typically aussie vulgarity persisting in the album's hit, “The Minotaur”, where our Drones play a bit at being Beasts of Bourbon, it is those electro-acoustic ballads typical of the more southern American tradition, narrated however with Libbard's shamelessly Australian accent, that hold this album together.

Beyond the musical side of “Havilah”, fresh and well-crafted, perhaps sometimes verbose, but certainly not original, what strikes the most is the ease and sincere clarity with which the emotional side shines through because the intimate worldview of “Oh My” (“People are a waste of food”), the dark Waitsian reminiscences (“Instead of shedding tears, I've learned to drink and piss instead...”), the delicate melancholy of “Careful As You Go”, the resignation of “Cold and Sober”, and the enveloping stream of consciousness of “Luck in Odd Numbers”, almost spoken-word at times, are burning testimonies of being born in the wrong world, seeing how one's dreams have been covered by an immense mire of uncertainty.
“Your Acting’s Like the End of the World”, the jewel of the album, is the tearful final explosion of this emotional trip. It sounds a bit like the escape from a lost love aboard the dusty bed of the oldest and most rustic of pickups. It sounds a bit like camping in front of Ayers Rock and smoking your cigarette as if it were the last one.

"Havilah" will be a balm for all those who, after a period of defeats, disappointments, and heaps of crap thrown in their face by life, will need to hear from someone who has had it even worse. That is enough.