It’s been 10 years since the last MESH album ‘Looking Skyward’…
The duo of Mark Hockings and Richard Silverthorn continue to be a live draw in Europe while the former has been busy with his BLACKCARBURNING solo project. But the world has changed considerably since ‘Looking Skyward’ and now ‘The Truth Doesn’t Matter’ in this is the age of post-factual lies.
As if to make up for their recorded absence of nearly a decade, the new MESH album contains a whopping 16 tracks which capture the dark undertone of muddled political viewpoints that allow fascism to be normalised and empathy to be treated as the enemy.
Photo by Guido Braun
On the opening title song, “The truth doesn’t matter if no-one gets hurt” could be a catchphrase from that vile orange Mussolini and the song provides a stark statement on the present state of geopolitical affairs. Fast and frantic as the heavens open with heavy rainfall, ‘A Storm Is Coming’ needs no explanation in the fierce tension expressed lyrically and musically. Moving onto something moodier and more personal, ‘I Lost a Friend Today’ reflects on loss…
With a determined stance, ‘Trying to Save You’ is a MESH banger with futurepop inflections that will become a live favourite while featuring the delectable voice of Mari Kattman, ‘Bury Me Again’ is a steadfast epic which gets an eerie angelic ending. ‘I Bleed Through You’ provides more emotive propulsion in another classic MESH anthem, as does ‘Kill Us With Silence’ which does electro rock far better than DEPECHE MODE have done in the last 20 years… there, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK has said it AGAIN!
With stabbing synths and a rumbling triplet, the cut and thrust metaphors of ‘Exile’ could be seen on personal or political levels, but if taken as the latter, there are questions on the rise of far right extremism as the turmoil is observed in isolation. Following that rousing highlight, there is another as MESH get into an 808 STATE on the rousing ‘Everything As It Should Be’ with a simple but effective synth solo to boot in “the path of least resistance”.
The more sparsely orchestrated ‘Hey Stranger’ is offset by wonderfully bubbling arpeggios for one of those sad MESH ballads while with an acoustic strum amongst the sequences and string machines, ‘Not Everyone Is Lonely’ heads towards the home straight with the message to “don’t get left behind”. The closing mandate is to ‘Be Kind’ and “enjoy their success when you are not at your best”; this is Hockings’ clarion call to his ‘Friends Like These’ to avoid “the judgement of crowds”.
Every type of MESH track is gathered on ‘The Truth Doesn’t Matter’; there’s the fast ones, the anthemic stompers, the emotive slowies and the instrumental interludes ranging from the dramatic cinematics of ‘Polygraph’, the rhythmic computer speech-laden ‘1031030’ and the brooding spy drama of ‘Cipher’ which could be mistaken for present-day Gary Numan. There is a lot of MESH to take in on this new body of work, but fans will be extremely happy with what is on offer with the double opus that is ‘The Truth Doesn’t Matter’.
‘The Truth Doesn’t Matter’ is released by Dependent Records on 27th March 2026, formats include limited edition boxset signed by MESH, hardcover 2CD artbook including exclusive 9 track bonus CD The Full Truth, gatefold black vinyl double LP and standard CD – pre-order from https://spkr.store/collections/mesh
MESH 2026 live dates include:
Oberhausen Kulttempel (2nd April), Berlin Huxleys (3rd April), Hamburg Docks (4th April), Leipzig Felsenkeller (5th April), Prague Lucerna Music Bar (6th April), Munich Backstage (7th April), Frankfurt Batschkapp (9th April), Cologne Carlswerk Victoria (10th April), Hannover Pavillon (11th April), Bristol Trinity (1st May), London 229 (2nd May), Sheffield Corporation (3rd May), Malmö Plan B (14th May), Gothenburg Musikens Hus (15th May), Copenhagen Viften (16th May), Taunton Electric Summer (30th August with Howard Jones), Liberec Dům Kultury (11th November)
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Text by Chi Ming Lai
2nd March 2026
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