In 2008, The Zutons released their third album You Can Do Anything. At the time, with Amy Winehouse delivering her soulful spin on their glorious anthem Valerie, perhaps they did feel as invincible as that title. But frontman Dave McCabe’s drinking was to drive a wedge through the band and members split off to join The Coral and Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, leaving McCabe, drummer Sean Payne and saxophonist Abi Harding – always their not-so-secret weapon – to pick up the pieces in Zutons Mk.2.
The Big Decider, their first album in sixteen years, is an impressive return to action and a reminder of this Liverpool band’s potency and imagination. Written in lockdown, recorded at Abbey Road Studios and produced by Nile Rodgers and their old associate, Lightning Seed Ian Broudie, it features a complementary blend of the sensitive and the celebratory.
Comeback single Creeping on the Dancefloor is a bruiser of a track with its rat-a-tat drums, George Harrison-like burnished guitar and McCabe’s robust vocals contributing to the Black Crowes-like rootsy rock vibe. The Seventies funk strut of Pauline joins Valerie in their pantheon of big characters before they lighten the mood with the cantering drums, sultry dreampop vocals and delicate jazzy piano of Water and its refreshing imagery: “let the water run, it brings life”.
The indie rhythm’n’blues of the title track is a bittersweet cut infused with old soul as McCabe reflects that “those yesterdays always creep up on me”. Rodgers makes a philosophical spoken word cameo on Disappear, while Harding adds a soulful solo to the twinkly, yearning ballad Company and channels the spirit of Bacharach & David for her classy, brassy opening to Rise, another pleasing slice of vulnerability.
They save the worst for last. Best of Me is an underwhelming finale, with the band playing it tender and tempered rather than triumphant, as if slightly cowed – but it’s the only moment of ambivalence on The Big Decider.
