Album Review: Wire – 10:20

Wire have been ploughing their studiously idiosyncratic furrow since 1976 and have become a sort of by-word for off-kilter post-punk music. Wire are intense and focused, dedicated to sticking to their musical manifesto without the distraction of chasing a forced commerciality or popularity. Yet Wire are immensely popular, even revered, and their outsider stance has endeared them to (now) generations of music lovers.

Yes, there was punk. There was Jimmy Pursey. There was also Wire and while Pursey and his ilk were vivid cartoons, Wire were Warhol. They toyed subversively with form and were deliberately and dangerously obtuse. They were also industrious and productive.

10:20 is evidence that not much in the Wire universe goes to waste. The album comprises what the band call ‘strays’ – leftovers and reworkings of pieces not accommodated elsewhere. While the material is drawn from many eras of the band’s existence, these recordings derive from sessions in 2010 (tracks 1-4) and more recently (tracks 5-8). To the Wire aficionado, these tracks will be known and even familiar. And yet the album works as a taster and a first step into the Wire universe.

10:20 is what Howard Devoto might have called ‘unhealthily fresh’. If you only know Wire by reputation, the almost slick rock/pop stylings of the ever-popular Boiling Boy or Small Black Reptile might make you wonder why the band have a reputation for being difficult. This is a mature and confident band that has found value in their previously discarded output. They know what they’re worth.

Sonically, this is a gorgeous album, full of coiling and sinuous motifs and unexpected Bowie-esque twists and turns that subvert what can be lush and polished arrangements. It’s an album that proves that a band that know themselves and their audience doesn’t have to do anything they don’t want to. Quite the opposite. Their methodology is simple and unchanged. Years of performance have honed the method. The result is a collection of simultaneously new yet old art-rock genius. More than a footnote, slightly less than a chapter.

10:20 by Wire is released via pinkflag on all platforms on 19^th June.