Cut Worms – ‘Transmitter’ album review: A sunny day of a record
The sun is breaking through a blue sky, daring to beam some warmth down into mid-March. Every time the world wakes up to a day like this, while society around us burns and collapses on basically every level, the rays almost have us daring to believe that maybe, just maybe, things could be okay. That’s basically how Cut Worms’ fourth album, Transmitter, feels.
The Skinny: Last month, for Valentine’s Day, Jeff Tweedy shared a cover of Cameron Winter’s ‘Love Takes Miles’. With no fuss and no overcrowding beyond a nice guitar and his own great voice, Tweedy’s cover demanded everyone pay attention to just how beautiful that song is, and how stunning lyrics like “love will make you fit it all in the car” truly are. With the ability to do that, and clearly the knowledge that sometimes the best things can be simple and obvious, Tweedy was obviously best placed to take on production duties for this Cut Worms record.
“Obvious” feels like the right word as the artist very much is not reinventing the wheel here. But does he need to? You only have to get to track two, ‘Evil Twin’, before the record’s Beatles-like energy smacks you round the face. Specifically, it smacks of George Harrison, of his point-proving solo debut and the anthems he delivered to the band, which were always pretty simple in their structure but staggering in their impact.
Cut Worms’, or Max Clarke’s, album is all of the above. With Tweedy on hand to get rid of any overcrowding, the result is great bones polished until they gleam on an album that understands the power of something classic.
It’s an album that makes no mystery of its influences as Clarke goes hard on the classic rock, nostalgic sound, from Bob Dylan’s folkishness to those heavier Harrison guitar moments, like on ‘Don’t Look Down’. But when he’s bringing his own stories to the table and his own lyrical flair, it feels fresh enough.
Mostly, though, Transmitter is simply a lovely, lovely album. Clarke’s voice sounds great, his guitar tones are warm and sunny.
It’s exactly the kind of record you want soundtracking your house in the spring, or playing on a tinny speaker during that first park picnic of the year. It bottles that feeling of a good day after a bunch of gloomy ones, and literally, who has ever got tired of that? But the asterisk that restricts it is whether it competes with the classics of this songwriting style.
The Verdict: Is it groundbreaking? No, it’s not. But it is an album that is perfected in its purity. It’s one of those endlessly difficult records to review, as there are no glaring problems nor any truly bold experiments to focus on. Instead, what you have is something easy, pretty, and oddly comforting. What you have is exactly what I said before – simply a lovely, lovely album.
Standout Track: ‘Don’t Look Down’
Release date: March 13th, 2026 | Producer: Jeff Tweedy | Label: Jagjaguwar
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