The Reds, Pinks and Purples - The Town That Cursed Your Name

Attentive fans - of which i know there are many - will be quick to note that rarely a week or two passes without a new transmission from the desk of Glenn Donaldson, but if we're to be official about these things, The Town That Cursed Your Name classes as the fifth album in four years. Nevertheless, lineage and notions of 'new' or 'best' are essentially moot points in the world of The Reds, Pinks and Purples. Donaldson has created a perpetually generating universe of song and sentiment, each track an iterative part of a wider vision regardless of when it was actually recorded or for what kind of release. What we already know remains the same: a distinct vista cast from the kitchensink of a San Francisco apartment that time and again manages to perfectly reflect a pan-generational understanding of indie/pop (not indiepop, or at least not just) classicism. The same signifiers abound - the linked album art, the consistently pithy lyricism, the verse-chorus mastery, the melodies that never run out... The Town That Cursed Your Name once again does that trick twelve times over, while also stressing its difference in the catalogue by formulating a neat Kinks-ian conceptual thread that addresses band politics, creative potentials and sometimes impossible, failing dreams. Donaldson's greatest strength is the ability to make each time he does it as vital as the last, the temptation for the listener to return irresistible. This is something others might call timeless, but such classifications feel complacent, a lazy placeholder that doesn't zero in on the right qualities. The Reds, Pinks and Purples hot streak runs ever on, but don't take it for granted - it's as remarkable as it is seemingly effortless. Writers like Donaldson don't come around too often.