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Oct 28, 2015 The Chills By Michael Wojtas

As the sole constant member of The Chills, Martin Phillipps spent the 1980s dreaming up some of indie pop’s earliest (and greatest) songs. Irrepressible single “Heavenly Pop Hit” spurred a brief commercial peak in the early ‘90s, which was followed by a couple decades’ worth of all too real travails (addiction, illness, endless lineup changes) that contrasted sharply with the whimsical fantasies The Chills created on record. So it comes as one of 2015’s most welcome surprises that Phillipps, backed by a new band, should return with Silver Bullets, his first studio full-length in 19 years.

While it’s a minor triumph that Phillipps is even writing and recording at all, jangling new highlights “Molten Gold” and “Silver Bullets” provide quaint yet tangible pleasures. Though these songs can’t replicate the mystifying beauty of classics “Pink Frost” and “Night of Chill Blue,” there’s still a genuine magic that comes with hearing Phillipps paint in different aural hues.

Righteous political anger surfaces on the somewhat clumsy, syllable-stuffed “America Says Hello”; much sharper is “Tomboy,” which finds Phillipps reframing his social concerns in a more personal context while offering insight into the darker aspects of childhood that go ignored by so many other poets of innocence. Silver Bullets proves Phillipps is still in touch with his awed, boyish vision, which has only been enriched—rather than tainted—by experience. (www.softbomb.com)

Author rating: 6.5/10