4/5 stars

Between this album and Faith No More’s last (the confusingly titled Album Of The Year), 18 years have transpired. That’s most of my life, and it makes me feel pretty small.

Faith No More, though, are known for their experimental vivre. In the past, the band has gifted the world songs influenced by trip hop, jazz, rap and grunge– and let’s not forget that cover of that Commodores song. In other words, they’re not here for the small things.

That outward experimentation doesn’t really exist on Sol Invictus – although ‘Black Friday’ pulls a lot from Ipecac stablemates, Italian country-somethings Guano Padano – but the band’s single-minded, determined method of doing things its own own way (with an alternative rock foundation) is still very much in place.

Before settling down to write Sol Invictus, Faith No More spent a few years on a reunion tour. A lot of the cobwebs would have been swept away then, and it shows on this album. There are parts now and again where WD-40 could have come in use, but for the most part the ageless rockers retain the sheen, belying the fact that it’s been almost a generation since their last originals.

When translated from Latin, the album’s name means ‘unconquered sun’. I don’t have the room to really extrapolate on that poetry, so I’m just going to say it’s pretty bloody accurate.

Faith No More’sSol Invictusis out through Reclamation/Ipecac.

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