While a sophomore album focusing on the burden of touring a successful first album is a bit of a cliché, A Hero’s Death gets away with it due to their ever-impressive songwriting.

Following last year’s debut album, Dogrel, widely lauded, nominated for the Mercury Prize, and being crowned Rough Trade’s album of the year, Fontaines D.C. return now with their sophomore album, A Hero’s Death. While tonally this album is a lot more sombre, ditching a lot of the punky sounds which made their debut so popular, the songwriting and production are turned up a notch. Though the album lacks the immediacy we saw in tracks like “Boys in the Better Land” and “Chequeless Reckless”, I hope the end result might instead offer a bit more longevity.

While the lyrics on Dogrel tended to focus on the city of Dublin, with references to pubs such as the “Liberty Belle” and “The Lotts”, A Hero’s Death is a bit more introspective. “I Don’t Belong”, for example, seems to focus on lead singer Grian Chatten’s identity issues, being born in England but growing up in Ireland without a sense of belonging to either. The tone is, like many songs from this new album, sombre — the feeling of not belonging being rather lonely. The verses focus on rejection of kindness or commendation, the first causing a ruckus and wanting to put up barriers; the second in an effort to stick to his principles. This track, straight off the bat, contrasts quite heavily with the punchy sound we’ve heard before, sounding a lot more mature in doing so. Most notably, I’d say, the production is a big step up from Dogrel, despite sticking with the same producer, Dan Carey. Many of the slower songs sounded awkward before but I don’t feel that this is the case here at all.

The same cannot be said for “Love Is the Main Thing”, however, which I find crushingly boring. Though I enjoy the throbbing instrumentals to begin with, they go nowhere. Neither do the vocals, which I’d argue to be occasionally beyond Chatten’s range, nor do the lyrics — with half of the lines in the song being its title. “Televised Mind” is a return to form that repeats the throbbing bass sound but expands on it. This track, as Chatten has said, is about the issues with being stuck in an echo chamber: “They're all gulls in the sky/They all mimic love's cry”. In this situation, he argues, all personality is stripped away. The sound of this track is much more alike classic Fontaines D.C., with Chatten’s thick Dublin accent shout-singing over a punchy post-punk instrumental.

“A Lucid Dream” follows this with a very similar sound, focusing on the lucid dreamlike feeling of the band’s rise over the past year. The lyrics read like Chatten’s stream of consciousness when the “rain changed direction”: present physically but maybe not mentally. The harsh guitar on the backend of the track also really sticks out, somehow replicating the feeling of being overwhelmed. “You Said” is quite a sharp turn in sound, taking a much softer tone but continuing the theme of their quick rise to fame and their need to pace themselves. These slower songs on A Hero’s Death are definitely where they have most improved; songs such as “Roy’s Tune” on Dogrel were just not as well executed. Having said that, “Oh Such a Spring”, while pretty, turns out slow to the point where it begins to bore – not all the slow songs are hits here.

The title track, “A Hero’s Death” is one of the strongest on the record. The band have cited the Beach Boys as being an influence on the sound of the album, and this is the first time that that shows, with some harmonising backing vocals in the bridge. I really like this as a way of expanding their sound, feeling like a genuinely unique addition to a post-punk song. The lyrics here are alike an uplifting speech, on the surface encouraging people to live life to the fullest. However, Chatten has said that the focus of the lyrics is more cynical than that: a satire of the cheesy lines we are bombarded with in advertisements, appropriating these little sparks of life advice to sell products. The video for this song depicts a talk show host going through the motions each day while everything around him becomes progressively more disturbing and he struggles to connect with people more. While also a little tongue-in-cheek, this could be a reference to how they felt spending all of 2019 touring, performing every day while progressively becoming more emotionally and physically drained.

This is followed by “Living in America”. Instrumentally, I really enjoy this song, but similarly to “Love Is the Main Thing” the vocals are just beyond his range. Personally, I think they would have been better bringing this up an octave, permitting his voice to match the powerful instrumental, as I feel the poor vocal performance really damages an otherwise great track. We also find that powerful and punchy sound in “I Was Not Born”, which features a real punk energy both sonically and lyrically: “I was not born/Into this world/To do another man’s bidding”. However, it also suffers in a similar way to “Love Is the Main Thing” in that it doesn’t really go anywhere. There is a clumsy instrumental bridge in it too where nothing really happens for about 30 seconds.

“Sunny” is probably my favourite track from the album, which surprised me as I was expecting it to be one of their more punchy, punky songs which would grip me the most. The Beach Boys influence returns here in force with some beautiful harmony throughout. In terms of production, this song also feels rich and layered, curating a daydream feeling. The lyrics return to the whirlwind of constant touring and feeling overworked in a rather poetic manner – you can really tell they became friends by chatting about and writing poetry together. “No”, the closing track, is another softer song. It is more stripped back than many of the other songs here, with emphasis on its vocals. It’s probably Chatten’s best vocal performance throughout the album. However, it’s also just not that memorable a song – definitely not one that I’d listen to beyond the context of the album.

While a sophomore album focusing on the burden of touring a successful first album is a bit of a cliché, A Hero’s Death gets away with it due to their ever-impressive songwriting. They also balance enhancing their sound with improved production and the introduction of vocal harmonies without just abandoning that which made them so popular. Overall, I felt that the compromise for this slightly more mature approach was losing a bit of the punch of their earlier tracks. While I enjoyed many of the tracks here, there are definite misses too, with “Love Is the Main Thing” sticking out the most for me. Another gripe I have with this album is that while Fontaines D.C. have established their sound, it’s still nothing new; the main thing that distinguishes them is Chatten’s accent bleeding through (which I love). Despite this, I still really enjoy this album. While they were sticking with a classic post-punk sound a lot of the time, they were absolutely nailing it. I just hope in the future that they could maybe branch out beyond this.