“This City” is one of those sonic love/hate letters that only cities like New York can evoke in people, that sense of living somewhere hard-edged, unforgiving, brutal, and relentless…yet, despite that, you know you couldn’t live anywhere else. Think of it as an updated version of the sentiment that fuelled Ryan Adams “New York New York” or “Michael Monroe*‘s “Ballad of the Lower East Side.”
And if you are going to write about such a cold-hearted town, you need the sound to go with it, and Fringe Frontier has that in spades – a world-weary, dark and grooving, garage rock sound, one running on fumes through years of emptying the tank, with just enough energy to get the job done but still going beyond it and giving it their all. It’s an outstanding balance of desperation and defiance, the upbeat heart of a beaten generation, and it perfectly sums up those mean streets. (I should know, I got mugged there!)
It is the great American novel summed up in a three-minute rock song; it is Catcher in the Rye’s snotty attitude in a form that you can boogie to; it is the sound of sleaze-rock finding its perfect subject matter. It’s edgy, full of attitude, and in your face. In short, it’s brilliant! Just like New York City itself.
