The Maccabees – Marks to Prove It

The Maccabees have returned with their fourth offering, almost a decade after the south London quintet first burst onto the UK’s indie radar. The result is an album shaped by the space in which it was created – namely a two-room studio in Elephant & Castle. The homage to the area is by no means latent; the album’s artwork depicts the brutalistic Michael Faraday Memorial, which stands stoically in the middle of the northern roundabout outside the Underground station.

The lyrics often allude to drinking – on ‘Spit It Out’ front man Orlando Weeks bemoans “There’s one to wash it down…”; ‘Kamakura’ mentions “Drinking when you’re drunk” and ‘Dawn Chorus’ tells of a person who “…swigs a bottle” – perhaps capturing a darker side to city, or perhaps suggesting the band’s reaction to inhabiting a seemingly claustrophobic recording space, again reinforcing the influence of Southwark’s most notable road junction.

‘Pioneering Systems’ ironically may be the least-pioneering song on the album; with its hushed voices and blurred tones marking its presence somewhat diminutive amongst the cascaded sounds of title track ‘Marks to Prove It’ and the erratic bass and elated guitar turbulences of ‘Kamakura’.

The glimpses of dazing beauty that emerge throughout the album are marks that indeed prove The Maccabees’ as indie icons, although there are moments where the record as a whole falls short of the strength and potency of its title track.

Words by Kate Goodrum