Dependent Records – 27th March 2026
Christopher Nosnibor
Now in their thirty-fifth year, MESH have always unapologetic in the way their music reflects and incorporates their influences, spanning Yazoo, Depeche Mode, Giorgio Moroder, Massive Attack, and Depeche Mode. It’s the latter that seems to cast the longest shadow over their latest offering – an album brimming with uptempo anthems propelled by driving beats, urgent synth bass grooves and busy sweeping lead lines.
In this context, it’s often all too easy to get swept along on the tide of electric energy and skim over the lyrical content, which is considerably darker, as the title reflects. As they summarise, ‘This is the age of post-factual lies…’ and as they grapple with difficult times, there’s ‘a dark undertone that occasionally seeps into their new songs’. There’s a feeling that anyone who isn’t affected by the current state of the world is either ignorant or in denial, and for those operating within the arts or any creative fields, I would question how it’s possible to create without these external conditions filtering into the work. And how can anything not be political right now? Time was – not so long ago – when a lack of acceptance or belief in official versions of events was the domain of fringe conspiracy theory. Now governments blatantly lie to our faces: Israel are adamant that every death in Gaza was a member of Hamas, or otherwise a ‘human shield’, the USA insist that they’ve won the war with Iran and have decimated their nuclear capabilities which were likely to destroy the entire Western world tomorrow, and the UK government insists it’s in no way involved or even complicit in any of this. Meanwhile, there’s nothing to see in the Epstein files. Right.
For all that, there’s a lot of emphasis on relationships and the like. Timeless issues, which cut to the core of the human condition, but not necessarily hitting the heart of the zeitgeist. But it’s impossible to be contemporary and timeless, I guess.
On The Truth Doesn’t Matter, MESH are straight out of the traps with a brace of back-to-back anthems, before arriving at the slower ‘I Lost a Friend Today’, which conveys a deep, painful sincerity – but at the same time it emotes with the dramatic flourishes that only a band with gothier leanings could pull off. But then the buoyant disco beat and skittering, soaring synths of ‘Trying to Save You’ somewhat undermine the sentiment. The same is true of ‘I Bleed Through You’, on which some heavy words are diminished by a poppy disco backing.
‘Kill Us With Silence’ follows the same template, but the dark shades are overtones rather than undercurrents: the gothier leanings work well here, as do the more experimental shades of the sample-soaked ‘1031030’, which has a read 80s vintage feel to it.
MESH are definitely at their best when they go dark, and when they go experimental. Single cut ‘This World’ straddles the different aspects of the album, and as such, is arguably the single song which most accurately represents what The Truth Doesn’t Matter. The same is true of ‘Exile’: it’s a belting dark pop tune, but it’s a bit too Erasure to really reach those emotional depths.
There’s no lack of quality or consistency here in terms of songwriting or production, so the only issue is its stylistic focus, or lack of, and just how poppy it is for an album which aims to venture into dark domains. But sixteen tracks is a lot, especially when the majority are four or even five minutes long. The Truth Doesn’t Matter, but focus does, and while it’s not a bad album, trimming it down and concentrating on the theme of its title would have likely made for a more focused album, and one with greater impact.
AA
AA
Aural Aggravation 