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...quatrain: "It's best in the morning / When we know it won't be rushed / So leave the curtains closed / And come back when you've brushed." As with any Arab Strap song, listeners are treated to a familiar moment, sketched without sentimentality. Indeed, the real break The Red Thread offers from Arab Strap's previous albums may not be optimism so much as objectivity. Asked in an interview after their last release whether his lyrics were a kind of therapy, Moffat responded, "No, no. It's much more childish than that. I'd call it revenge," revenge upon estranged...
Moffat's lyrical confessions have always damned himself as much anyone, but on The Red Thread, he seems most interested in damning the disappointing comedowns inherent in love. On "Infrared," a song about concealing the warm residue of casual sex, Moffat concludes, "At least we know we're fuckable / At least we're sated and we're tired / At least the bedroom stinks / And we know we're desired." Those lyrics also belie the new lyricism that defines this album. We see it in the repetition of "at least." More than ever before, the lyrics rhyme and revolve around choruses...
Arab Strap's sound is a mix of programming and instrumentation, and the result has often been spare beats and a repeated chord that crescendos in silence, or sudden musical murk. This format is not at all abandoned on The Red Thread, but it is supplemented with strings and piano. In "Haunt Me," Arab Strap has perhaps their most crowd-pleasing song to date, a melodic work built around a few spare lyrics: "So haunt me / Cause I know / You'll keep me / In to," a double rhyme with gory details...
While these subtle shifts in style--bitterness traded for objectivity, a new commitment to songfulness--differentiate this album from previous ones. The Red Thread is basically another Arab Strap album. Arab Strap consistently produces sad, relaxing music. It is spare and, despite its obsession with post-coital anxiety, satisfying and wise. The band takes up common themes that usually inspire loud, angry rock and treats them delicately, like craftsman, with mature, objective description. Arab Strap has dignified the "songs about fucking" genre...
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