The Smile
Cutouts
XL
It was a delightful surprise to learn over the summer that The Smile would be treating us to a new record just under a year since the release of January’s Wall of Eyes. Between this latest project, Cutouts, and the last one, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood have both kept busy composing film scores, while the band’s drummer Tom Skinner has been touring with his Bishara band—hence the surprise. Less surprising, then, is the fact that Cutouts feels like a spiritual twin to Wall of Eyes, fitting in like the second part of a double album. This record, though, is the more solid of the two, as it sees the band improve upon their prog-influenced songwriting while crafting something more cohesive, engaging, and rhythmically pleasing than its predecessor.
You won’t find anything resembling the guitar-based rock of “Bending Hectic” here, as The Smile instead focus on synths, atonality, odd time signatures, angular riffs, and cinematic strings to fill out their heady vision. Cutouts opens slow and bittersweet with “Foreign Spies,” a synth-infused track that feels heavenly and light as Yorke sings “It’s a beautiful world” over glowing synths. Yet this sweetness suddenly feels tongue-in-cheek when we get a hefty dose of tension on the next track, which signifies darker themes and a more complex world than initially presented. “Instant Psalm” is a beautiful acoustic track with lush strings layered over top as its orchestral arrangements bring to mind the work of fellow composer John Luther Adams.
Things get proggy with “Zero Sum” and its angular, high-energy guitar riff recalling King Crimson’s “Thela Hun Ginjeet.” The Phrygian-sounding “Colours Fly,” then, introduces us to an even darker world with its arabesque chord progression that builds over the course of the song. On “Don’t Get Me Started,” things begin to slow down as guitars give way to electronic sounds. “I’m not the villain / Choose someone else,” sings Yorke defiantly over computerized beats as the lyrics, like many others on the album, explore identity and choice.
All of which leads up to “Tiptoe,” a jazzy, bright, Lydian-mode ballad with a simple piano arrangement and strings reminiscent of Greenwood’s The Master score or Radiohead’s Moon Shaped Pool. The following song, meanwhile, features a driving drum pattern reminiscent of In Rainbows’s “Jigsaw Falling Into Place.” “No words can express it,” sings Yorke on “No Words,” a decent track that feels a bit out of place on Cutouts. It’s a rare shortcoming on the record, which marks The Smile’s strongest to date. Their first two projects felt a bit more incongruent from track to track, giving a disjointed experience. For the most part, Cutouts doesn’t suffer from that same ailment. It’s a record that needs to be listened to from start to finish in one session to be appreciated fully—just like the movies its creators have taken to scoring outside of their work together.
