Lots to love about the new Sleater-Kinney record

Sleater-Kinney has never made a mediocre rock record and, after an initial listen, it seemed the time apart hasn’t worn away the individual talents of Janet Weiss, Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker, or the genius of their synergy. But just how good, after nearly a decade away — and with their own oeuvre as the competition — is No Cities to Love (Sub Pop)?

I was 9 when Sleater-Kinney debuted, and didn’t start listening to them until my early 20s. As such, I’ve learned to love them pretty much sans historical context. My attachment is to their songs, which, as combinations of words and guitar and drums, have few rivals (and no betters) over the last 20 years. Having heard them, there’s no getting over songs like “Heart Attack,” “Start Together” or “The Size of Our Love,” to name a very few.

And though nothing on No Cities quite knocks me over the way those songs did, there is still much to love: The rhythmic work of drums and synth on “Fangless,” the heaviness of “Fade” (which recalls their work on The Woods), intimations of dance music on “A New Wave,” the way Weiss calls down thunder on “No Anthems,” and the tunes and riffs which make you wonder, for all their beloved fierceness and bravery, if a full accounting has been made of how naturally musical they are.

Lyrically, they celebrate their abiding love on “Surface Envy”: “I feel so much stronger now that you’re here.” As for the politics: Greed, “the system” and dread all have their day, though the ladies refuse to succumb. And on closer “Fade,” they exorcise the enervation that made them quit in 2006: “If we are truly dancing our swan song, darling/ Shake it like never before.”