Gary Numan – Savage (Songs From A Broken World)

Gary Numan - Savage (Songs Of A Broken World)Album facts

Release: September 15th, 2017
Label: BMG
Genre: , , , ,
Discogs: Link

The godfather of melancholia

It's indeed applaud­able and for­mid­able as well that 'Gary Numan' now presents his 17th Studio album in his 40 years count­ing car­reer. To this I salute before I even say a thing about this new opus. Even more strik­ing is the fact, that he sticks to his roots without repeat­ing him­self like so many oth­ers do.

Over the years Gary Numan's albums got dark­er and more men­acing: After a very per­son­al 'Splinter (Songs Of A Broken Mind)' in which he worked out his strong depres­sion fol­lows now 'Savage (Songs From A Broken World)'. The record mir­rors our world's situ­ation pretty authen­tic­ally which is in fact not to be described as too pos­it­ive. Based on this theme, it is prac­tic­ally a concept album.

Grief for the advanced

Very lugubri­ously opens the piece 'Ghost Nation'. Carried along in a low pace it con­sists of Synth Pop ele­ments and Industrial influ­ences. Writing a chor­us where a sud­den shud­der shivers down your spine is com­pa­ra­bel to writ­ing a lyr­ic­al mas­ter­piece of the qual­ity of a Poe.

The second track reminds me – espe­cially in the begin­ning – of a bal­lad-like ver­sion of Ofrah Haza's 'Im Nin'Alu'. Oriental inspired strings and trum­pets linked with Gary Numan's gloomy voice stress this song's dysto­pi­an atmo­sphere. The epic chor­us hov­ers over this emo­tion­al set­ting and brings the whole con­struct to life.

The sound of a Gary Numan Hit

Gary Numan - Press Photo 2017
Gary Numan
Press Photo 2017

The first single 'My Name Is Ruin' is simply geni­us and deservedly the album's fig­ure­head. Is it radio-com­pat­ible? Hard to say, but who cares about it any­ways? None of the pri­or albums, includ­ing 'Savage' was made for pop radio sta­tions; although 'My Name Is Ruin' is most def­in­itely the catch­i­est song here.

My name is ruin
My name is heartbreak
My name is lonely
My sorrow's a darkness
Lyrics from 'My Name Is Ruin' by 'Gary Numan'

More serious than ever

'The End Of Things' is a bal­lad out of a pic­ture book. Strings, heav­enly angels' choirs and tra­gic vocals let you float and drift into your own state of mind. But before you com­pletly drift away, the chor­us comes to net you in again – a very sinewy and dynam­ic piece of work.

The fol­low­ing track 'And It All Began With You' is not the dance­floor kind of song. Instead the song comes up with deeply emo­tion­al lyr­ics that won't leave your eyes dry. It's not that it's espe­cially sad but to me it's very touch­ing because I can empath­ize very well hav­ing an intense real­tion­ship to a soul mate and the fear to loose some­thing so precious.

Soundtrack to the post-apocalypse

Electronic and Rock-Elements take off on the song 'When The World Comes Apart' and make it even dance­able with a suit­ing tempo. It's fas­cin­at­ing how an ener­get­ic song like this becomes all dark and dreary only by Gary Numan's voice. I'd dare say, he's the only per­son in the world who could be able to turn a song like 'Shiny Happy People' ('R.E.M.') into the ulti­mate super dark epic.

Minimalistic Industrial can be found in 'Mercy'. I even have a notion of 'IAMX' influ­ences in mat­ters of beat. Steady but with intensly vibrat­ing E‑Guitars and effects the song fights itself through the acous­tic­ally sim­u­lated desert, that is the base set­ting of this son­ic experience.

'What God Intended' is a bit­ter bal­lad over­laid with cold metal­lic sounds and jag­gedly vibrat­ing stat­ic. Hopeless and gruel­ing grind the lyr­ics like a dry pray­er noone believes in. This track is surely the most mel­an­chol­ic and the least access­ible on the album.

Like a rolling sandstorm

It's 'full speed ahead' with 'Pray For The Pain You Deserve' and its mil­it­ary up tempo beat. It does push the whole album a good way for­ward again. It's a battle call accom­pan­ied by harsh E‑Guitars, subtly exten­ded by effects like the sough of an approach­ing bomb. Apart from that, this song is a bril­liant Synth Pop song with Industrial elements.

A reward for all the suffering

Gary Numan landed a bull's eye with this record. There's noone in the Industrial/Electrorock scene who is able to pin­point des­pair, grief and the whole range of des­ol­ate feel­ings as exact as he does.

'Savage (Songs From A Broken World)' is a mas­ter­piece that will long stay unequaled. For me per­son­ally, this is one of the best Gary Numan albums ever. A must-buy for all Numan fans, and a defin­itve recom­mend­a­tion for every­one with a hint of mel­an­cho­lia and a love for elec­tron­ic music.

By the way, this album also made it into our art­icle ‘The best Synth Pop and genre-related albums 2017‘. Read now.

Track By Track Rating

Gary Numan - Savage (Songs Of A Broken World)
Gary Numan – Savage (Songs From A Broken World)
Ghost Nation
Bed Of Thorns
My Name Is Ruin
The End Of Things
And It All Began With You
When The World Comes Apart
Mercy
What God Intended
Pray For The Pain You Serve
Broken
Recommend
My Name Is Ruin
When The World Comes Apart
Pray For The Pain You Serve
Weak
Broken
4.1
Masterpiece

Most popular posts of the last 30 days

Founder
  1. Just watched him do Ruin on the BBC's "The Old grey Whistle Test" anniversary. After that went and got the album. AWESOME…!

  2. Played this through some good speak­ers and the sub-bass felt like it really was a record­ing of the end of the world. Soundscape vibra­tions in the place of bass­lines. Synth noises that I've nev­er heard before. Truly a mas­ter­piece of pro­duc­tion, so a big shout out to Ade Fenton for incred­ible work. The theme is remin­is­cent of Warriors in 1983, but where pic­tur­ing a post-apo­ca­lyptic waste­land then involved stand­ing in front of a pic­ture of a sun­set now he just needs to drive into the California desert. Soon the whole world could look like this and the cul­ture of the bedouin is going to become pretty main­stream. The fact that this album storms into Number 2 in the UK album charts sug­gests maybe Numan's emo­tion­al cry in the face of a bleak vis­ion of the future, seems pretty damn rel­ev­ant to the present. Plus, you can't beat those huge anthem choruses.

  3. An abso­lutely bril­liant album, great tracks all over it and cer­tainly one of the best albums he has ever released.. !

  4. A stag­ger­ingly good album. My Name Is Ruin has his daugh­ter join in for the Arabian-style wail­ing. Spine-tingling.

  5. Brilliant album. Have to dis­agree that Broken's a weak song, I'd like to see Numan con­tin­ue down that ambi­ent instru­ment­al path in the future.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Ghost Nation
Bed Of Thorns
My Name Is Ruin
The End Of Things
And It All Began With You
When The World Comes Apart
Mercy
What God Intended
Pray For The Pain You Serve
Broken
Final Score