ALBUM REVIEW: The Pale White – Inanimate Objects of the 21st Century

End of the Wall Recordings

Released: 27.03.26

Image by Saint Sophie

It’s yet to be a year since Newcastle’s The Pale White released their second album, The Big Sad, and proved themselves as accomplished merchants of alternative rock moulded by their classic rock influences. And they’re back again! Only this time with what the Wallsend brothers Jack and Adam Hope have dubbed their previous release’s “evil twin”, intended from its inception to be of a coarser calibre altogether.

This tone is established from the outset. Chugging open with Moth In The Headlights, the album’s second single, a rumbling bassline plunges into a spiral descent towards the enticing light of a black hole. The song’s lyrics question what could await us on the other side, whether thrilling, terrifying – or both? These questions underlie the record: on the precipice of the great unknown, how are we to navigate our current age? As daily lives become governed by labyrinthine entanglements of algorithms piled upon themselves, as artificial intelligence comes of age perhaps faster than expected, and as a passive experience of life is normalised, are we becoming the inanimate objects of our time? Such themes reoccur throughout, most notably on the deftly crafted Mannequin. Over twisting, turning chord changes and an uneasy but alluring rhythm, the tension between humanity and inactivity is compared to a hangover: numbing, and painfully self-induced.

Antidotes are, however, provided in the form of two more pre-released singles. Firstly, lead single Absolute Cinema: an earworm-ish, crowd-pleasing rocker in celebration of silver screen experiences. Complete with namedrops for Martin Scorsese and Peter Jackson’s epic trilogies and a music video shot at the historic Tyneside Cinema, this track is destined to become a mainstay of the Pale White’s repertoire. Secondly, and perhaps conversely, Göbekli Tepe: an immense psych rock belter in honour of its namesake, the ten-millennium-old excavated village in Turkey, which allows us to see into human life at the dawn of civilisation. Dizzying space-rock riffage abounds, accompanying the baffling thought that these ancient stones in some way represent the start of the domino run that culminated in the questions this album confronts today.

The Pale White will be taking their album to the road on a UK headline tour with a finale at Newcastle’s Boiler Shop on Friday 17th April, before accompanying Pixies to two landmark shows in Shanghai this summer.