After the success of ‘Tape Deck Heart’, album number 6 from Frank Turner had a lot to live up to. Dubbed as the album which launched Frank Turner into the public eye along with his appearance at the Olympic opening ceremony three years ago, it was going to be a hard act to follow, however ‘Positive Songs For Negative People’ has lived up to every expectation.
With sing along anthems like ‘Get Better’ and ‘The Next Storm’, the album highlights a new direction in Frank’s music, reflecting his feelings and a turn for the better in his personal life. These songs are extremely difficult to not dance down the street to, or at least mouth along to while looking like an idiot to everyone else.
What I love about Frank Turner is he can write anthems but also craft songs like ‘Mittens’, ‘Demons’ and ‘Josephine’ which to an untrained ear sound very upbeat but listening to the lyrics it still reflects Franks emotional intensity which you can hear a lot more obviously in his previous albums. Despite this being less obvious, his way with words is still present and is rivalled by very few songwriters (a close second to Scott Hutchison in my book but that’s just me (still waiting for a collaboration guys)).
More importantly he revisits his old stripped down style in this album, not seen as much in ‘Tape Deck Heart’, and there are a few more intimate songs such as ‘The Angel Islington’ and especially ‘A Song For Josh’ which certainly brings a tear to the eye in a touching tribute for his friend who committed suicide in 2013. These songs recognise the journey Frank’s been on and despite this album being titled as ‘Positive’, there are still bad times in anyone’s life. Songs like these show that you have to move through the bad times to make the good times better, a theme present throughout the album.
Overall this is a stunning album, reflective of Frank’s usual skilful lyricism but with a positive twist: 9/10
-Luke
-Luke
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