Label: Raygun Records
Released: 22nd March 2019
Rating: ★★★★
Keeping up the momentum from last year’s brilliant LP ‘Hold on to Your Heart’, ‘Wildheart Dreaming’ collects four more slabs of 80s pop-rock to tide us over to the next full-length.
Lead single ‘You Mean Everything’ follows the over the top 80s obsession of the main LP with a big chorus and bigger heart. ‘Ready to Call’ deals in the same kind of E-Street widescreen romance, while ‘Fight or Run’ is a reminder of the urgency they can deliver alongside their newfound mastery of last-dance power-ballads. They’ve gotten so good at this that going forward, it might be tempting to put out ‘Hold On To Your Heart, 2.0’, but the Xcerts have rarely stood still in the last ten years.
Final track ‘Real Love’ is less bombastic but might hint at a way forward, a spare acoustic guitar accompanying vocalist Murray Macleod through a fragile croon as his fingers scratch across the fretboard. It’s a tender offering that exercises restraint and expresses regret and is the most surprising inclusion here. However, with headline tour around the corner, the hint is in the defiant refrain of ‘Fight or Run’. “Scream your heart out, scream your heart out,” because these songs were made for it.
