The Snuts: Joy In Short Moments – Mature anthems from a band that’s here to stay (album review)

The Snuts’ fourth album presents the Scottish quartet in a particularly reflective mood, although their knack for stadium ready choruses is stronger than ever.

Up until recently, it seems the Snuts haven’t paused for a moment. Their debut album W.L. was a hit both in their native West Lothian and across the UK, launching straight to Number 1 with the help of their endearingly ragged indie hit Glasgow. Two more successful albums in Burn the Empire and Millennials made the Snuts the first band to score three top 3 albums in consecutive years since One Direction, even if Jack Cochrane and co’s palatable indie rock is yet to make much of an impact beyond these shores.

Joy In Short Moments is a sure bet to score the band another Number 1 album this week, with all the necessary singalong hooks and broad-appeal lyrics about ‘living and loving more’ present and correct.

It may be easy to scoff at Joy In Short Moments’ occasional reliance on cliché (PTS’s call to ‘light up the sky together’, for instance) but in 2026 there’s something genuinely refreshing about a band so determined to find a hopeful angle in these dark times. Defibrillator’s jaunty depiction of a living wake, for example, is a cheering reminder that funerals can be a celebration too.

Unlike the previous three albums, Joy In Short Moments was borne out of a period of rest between tours for the band. Cochrane’s joy at becoming a father is the bright thread that runs throughout these uplifting tracks, most obviously in the charming closer Little Marathon Man, which has a homespun, Maccabees-style campfire folk feel to it.

Perhaps some fans will miss the looser, more boyish hooks and jangly guitar playing from the Snuts’ earlier records, but Joy In Short Moments sounds like a band that have fully matured into men, musing thoughtfully on mortality, stillness and taking life less seriously more tastefully than ever. 

Joy In Short Moments will be released on 30th October 2026, via Happy Artist Records