Kicking Up the Dust [LP]

Troubled Times, Cast's 2011 comeback, was a bit too indebted to the Brit-pop group's past. It was produced by John Leckie, who helmed their 1995 debut All Change, and it often seemed like a tribute to the glory days of Cool Britannia, a sound the band wisely doesn't replicate on its 2017 sequel Kicking Up the Dust. Originally crowd-funded but given a mass release, Kicking Up the Dust finds Cast embracing different rhythms and textures, sometimes hinting at a bit of tense funk and sometimes settling into a mellow simmer. Cast leader John Power doesn't abandon his core pop classicism -- at their heart, these songs are British pop in the tradition of the Beatles -- but the richer production gives Kicking Up the Dust considerable (and welcome) color, turning it into a stronger album than not only its predecessor, but such '90s efforts as Mother Nature Calls and Magic Hour, as well. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine