It’s always a bit disappointing to hear a once revolutionary, visionary, zeitgeist-grabbing band or artist fall into a case of terminal stasis. The juice just stops flowing, the inspiration seeping away as core group members strive to simply maintain. Only the hardcore fans stick around, and everyone else politely pretends the band died in a fiery jet crash years ago.
New Order has slipped into this mode, to the shock of nobody. Mediocrity strikes rock musicians much in the way senility and loss of teeth strike the elderly. The band’s new album, “Waiting for the Sirens’ Call,” is a decent collection of songs typifying the blend of pop rock and dance-floor beats this group pioneered during the mid-1980s and early 1990s.
The problem is just that. This is a decent collection of songs but no great shakes in terms of the band’s catalogue. And the sound hardly deviates from what the band was doing 20 years ago. While a few tracks stand out from the rest, particularly “I Told You So” and “Morning Night & Day,” the majority of the album sounds outdated and tired.
The album is more of a holding pattern than an artistic achievement as the group fights off the creeping ennui that comes with musical old age. Listeners would better be served picking up a copy of “Republic” or something else from the era when New Order could dig into someone’s unconscious with ungodly efficiency. Unless this group has another creative rebirth up its sleeve, it might be best to write it off now.
— Ryan Nyburg