Where does Steven Van Zandt find these bands? It’s easy to imagine the Springsteen sideman and Wicked Cool Records founder prowling around with his ear pressed up against strange garages, listening for the vague strains of Hammond organs and Rickenbacker guitars in his never-ending quest to keep rock ’n’ roll alive.

Van Zandt made his way to the UK for his latest discovery, The Contrast, whose founder and lead singer David Reid hails from Glasgow — apparently by way of Liverpool, Memphis, L.A., the Brill Building and Asbury Park, judging from the variety of influences that make up the pop mélange on their new album, “God of Malfunction.”

And The Contrast — around since 1999, with the new album being their first of new material on the Wicked Cool label — has found a winning formula with Reid’s laconic vocals, the band’s exuberant backup singing (it seems they’ve never met a “bop-shoo-wop” they didn’t like) and an unabashed pop sensibility planted somewhere between the Spencer Davis Group and The Knack. (With a little bit of the Ramones thrown in, because I think that’s a requirement before they let you take the Wicked Cool oath.)

The album kicks off with an incredibly infectious trio of songs: “Underground Ghosts” starts things off on a driving high note, thanks to Thorin Dixon’s assured percussion, and “Coming Back to Life” offers the album’s catchiest couplet in “We are strange, getting stranger; we want change, we’ll screw the danger.” I have no idea what it means, but set against Kieran Wade’s carnivalesque keyboards it fuels the liveliest anthem you won’t hear on the radio this year.

The party continues on “Take Me Apart,” a rave-up that sounds like Freddy Cannon covering Cheap Trick’s “Dream Police.” Even when you think the space noises and echo chamber effects of “I Am An Alien” threaten to derail the proceedings, Reid’s unlikely sincerity saves the song from detouring too far down the road to cheesy.

The momentum of the album’s first half would have been tough to sustain, and while the Byrds jangle of “Gone Forever” is perfectly pleasant, things do get dicier on the proggy title track and a few others — like the sluggish “Better Than They Seem” — that seem to be going for moody but just come out murky. And while the label touts the album’s “Eno-esque ambient textures,” there are more than a few moments when Wade in particular seems to be trying a little too hard to get out of the garage rock box — he sounds like a demented Tony Banks impersonator.

Still, they successfully go darker near the end with the ’90s-tinged guitar rocker “Thought You Were Strong,” and on the whole make you hopeful for Van Zandt’s burgeoning garage rock resurgence. The Contrast deserve comparison to the Gaslight Anthem with their pounding drums and penchant for “splintered good luck charms and fast cars,” and I hope they see some of the same success.

“God of Malfunction” may not be the most sophisticated album you’ll hear this year, but it may be the one most likely to help save rock ’n’ roll.

The Contrast, “God of Malfunction,” Wicked Cool Records, April 13.

[From Album Review: The Contrast, 'God of Malfunction' - Waltham, MA - The Daily News Tribune]

However, as of this week the recording is officially titled “The God of Malfunction”. This is hardly surprising as that track is one of the stand-out tracks contained on the record. No news yet on when it will be released. I’ll keep you posted.

David Goes a Bit Mad

So I’m guessing that you think it is all a bit too quiet on thecontrast.net. The band has been locked away somewhere in Leeds working hard on their follow-up album to “Underground Ghosts”. It seems things are going well.

Recording has been completed on The Contrast’s sixth studio album. A total of 15 songs have emerged, it is not yet known if all of these will make the final cut. I would say that they are going to have a hard time picking and choosing from this bunch. Now the work commences with picking a running order and designing art and so on. No release date is set yet but I will keep you posted and pass that on as soon as we know.

While they were in the studio the band took some photos of their experience. From these you can gain an insight into the really hard slog that is involved in making a new album. See the picture in this post for an example. These are posted in the Photo Gallery on this site.

The working title for the album is “Good Luck Charms & Fast Cars” and as yet no release date is scheduled,  when it is you will also hear that news here. A demo version of “Better Than They Seem”,  a track from the new album, was released on the Wicked Cool, South by Southwest sampler released in March.

Wicked Cool

The Contrast have not yet gone in to the studio to start recording their new album yet but one track will be coming our way sooner rather than later. Wicked Cool Records are living up to their name and releasing a demo version of one of the tracks from the new album. The track “Better Than They Seem” from the tentatively titled, forthcoming “Good Luck Charms and Fast Cars” will feature on a special Wicked Cool, South by Southwest (SXSW) sampler. It is a storming track featuring a much bigger sound than we have heard from The Contrast in the past. The new album is shaping up to be the best yet. I know I say that for every release, but am I ever wrong?

Unfortunately, The Contrast will not be playing at this year’s SXSW festival in Austin, Texas they will be far too busy working on the new album. However, once they are out of the studio we can expect them to start playing more shows in preparation for the promotion of their first proper release for Wicked Cool.