Bombay Bicycle Club – ‘My Big Day’ album review: as warm as freshly baked bread
A lot has changed since Bombay Bicycle Club released their debut single ‘Evening/Morning’ in 2008. Not only has Britain slowly devolved into a cesspit of crooked governments, social divide and an economy that seems to perpetually enjoy covering itself in financial excrement, but the musical landscape is now broader than ever before. Bombay Bicycle Club return in 2023 to take advantage of this change with their latest record, My Big Day.
As the world has changed over the last 15 years of their existence, so too have the listeners of Bombay Bicycle Club. Those who found the band’s laid-back, jaunty indie stylings in 2008 have likely grown out of their childhood homes and into their far smaller rented accommodation — damn economy — now trudging through the world as fully-fledged adults, with measly pension contributions and a far more grisly view of the world.
‘Eveneing/Morning’ and its follow-up ‘Always Like This’ saw Jack Steadman, Jamie MacColl, Suren de Saram, and Ed Nash become indie rock heroes almost overnight. They infused what had become a somewhat toxic indie sleaze scene with a welcomed slice of homemade charisma. Unique in its sun-dappled delivery and yet still familiar enough to feel like a timeless piece of rock and roll. 2009’s LP, I Had the Blues But I Shook Them Loose, would solidify this notion and see the group gain huge BBC Radio 1 airplay.
The foursome would excel with the newfound platform and become festival mainstays as well as chart-topping heroes for a new generation of music lovers. This may all seem relatively trivial, but the truth is, I haven’t been able to call myself a fan of the band since those first two singles back in ’08/09, and so the arrival of My Big Day fell on my desk with the heavy “wamp” of a graceless hippopotamus.
I was relatively certain I had heard it all before with Bombay Bicycle Club. There would be a simple, jaunty rhythm capable of propelling a kooky canal boat through East London’s Victoria Park, the hushed vocals of Steadman stretched just enough to create a somewhat contrived sense of effortlessness and a heap of glittering imagery, all designed to deliver a record as likely to be bought en masse as it was forgotten about. But My Big Day is so much more.
Three years on from their previous recommencement of affairs with Everything Else Has Gone Wrong following a 2016 split, and the band are back at the starting line of another album. As the staccato-adjacent rhythm of ‘Just A Little More Time’ pours out of my speakers, there is a sense that something, this time, is different.
That’s ironic, considering that the album’s opener is little more than crescendoing brass and a repeated title. But it still feels fresher than anything the band have released in a little while, with the beaming ‘Rural Radio’ the clearest testament to that. This continues on ‘I Want To Be Your Only Pet’ (forever misremembered by this reviewer as “I want to be your rolling pin”) as Steadman’s vocals transcend horizontal drive into an effervescent gospel lift.
One of the best moves made by the band on this record is the introduction of featured artists. The broadest strokes are taken when they team up with feature artists such as the wildly talented Jay Som (‘Shapeless’), folk hero in the making Holly Humberstone (‘Diving’), acclaimed songwriter Nilfer Yunya (‘Meditate’, and one of the best songs on the LP) and national hero Damon Albarn (‘Heaven’ — complete with harp and triumphant brass accompaniment). Each one acts as a wonderfully double-edged sword, allowing the audience to not only relish in the introduction of a new voice but appreciate its choral ability to lift the entire song.
This is perhaps the finest trick the group pull off. My Big Day isn’t a huge departure from the band’s core sonic principles, yet it sounds and feels as fresh as warm bread. Whether it is through a deliberate return to their original creative constitution, a lack of care for the reception the record will receive or simply that the band are back to their best, this album feels like a maturation of the original starter kit that saw them turn into ready-baked brilliance 15 years ago.
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