Maxïmo Park - Nature Always Wins (Album Review) Wednesday, 03 March 2021 Written by Graeme Marsh Very few things put a band on the map in the UK quite like a Mercury Prize nomination, which Maxïmo Park secured with their zeitgeisty post-punk debut ‘A Certain Trigger’ in 2005. Since that hyped up burst of energy bounded into the room, though, the group have walked along similar lines, releasing five albums without quite being able to eclipse that initial pumped-up breath of fresh air. With ‘Nature Always Wins’, though, we have something pretty exciting on our hands. Now operating primarily as a trio for the first time, here the band find a little more freedom. With producer Ben Allen based in Atlanta the album was constructed like a long-distance jigsaw puzzle thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic, which was perhaps an even bigger challenge than Allen’s request for 40 songs to play with.