When bands release a successful debut album, there are often two criticisms that are levelled against them as they progress forward; either they don’t evolve their sound enough, or they move things on too much and are therefore seen to have lost sight of the band that they were. Franz Ferdinand is a band that is now onto studio album number four, and on the basis of the ‘Right Action’ single (and ‘Love Illumination’ that was unveiled the same day in fact) their sound still remains very much the same. ‘Right Action’ is a track that could very much be mistaken for having been included on the band’s 2004 debut, it’s now close to a decade later and Franz Ferdinand’s music still has the exact same feel and vibe about it.
With a very simple driving bass line throughout and the unmistakeable vocal tone of Alex Kapranos, I don’t think there are too many people out there by now that’d listen to this track and not recognise it as a Franz Ferdinand song. ‘Right Action’ has the positive quality of familiarity about it, but this is also a key area for criticism as it marks out the bands lack of progression over the past decade and a lack of willingness to step out of their comfort zone. It’s an inoffensive piece of indie pop music that’d probably pass the time fairly adequately on a car journey, but then we already have plenty of tracks of this ilk from the band to choose from and ‘Right Action’ in no way improves upon what Franz Ferdinand has already presented to us many times over in the past.
If you’ve followed the career of Franz Ferdinand and been pleased with the band’s output thus far then ‘Right Action’ should be another track that’ll be right up your street, if however you became despondent with the band’s lack of willingness to take any risks with their music a while back then there’s nothing new here that’ll likely change your mind. ‘Right Action’ is an okay piece of music, but by now it all just feels a little too tried and tested.
UK based film graduate with a huge passion for music, sports and video games.
