Barcelona's Lux already have a demo and a promising debut album under their belt, but with this recent EP their sound really clicks into gear, in which some of the more excentric strands of 80s post- and hardcore punk - Man Sized Action and The Proletariat come to mind - collide with distinctive goth/deathpunk bass lines. You might also be reminded of more recend bands like Street Eaters or the potent cowpunk propulsion of Murderer.
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What the title promises, this record delivers. Danceable shit? You bet! Anarchist messages? Tons of those get proclaimed here in such density you really can't miss or ignore them. Musically, this is not exactly something you'd associate with anarcho punk, although this stuff clearly has much of the same spirit. This is infectouis post punk with a punchy postcore edge which, despite its dancefloor effectiveness, also succeeds in the noise department, showing no fear of waking up the neighbors. This, and their explicitly political lyrics seperate them quite a bit from last decade's short-lived dance punk explosion. Instead of New York cool you get an appropriately blunt and distinctly british sense of urgency, even as they seem to share many of the same influences. Gang Of Four, obviously, as well as Minutemen, mid- to late eighties Membranes, The Pop Group. And in the present, comparing them to Tics, Pill, Slumb Party, Special Interest or UZS wouldn't be too far off.
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On their debut LP, Barcelona's Sandré deliver a roundhouse kick of unerring precision, a sound located somewhere on the fringes of post punk, post- and noisecore; always keeping the delicate balance between a raw, immediate impact and self-confident ambition. Speculating about possible influences, i'm thinking of a wide array of bands like Downtown Boys, early Die! Die! Die!, Les Savy Fav - but i'm also feeling a very distinct vibe akin to other spanish acts of recent years, especially the likes of Juventud Juché, Betunizer and Cubano Vale.
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Warp hail from San Francisco and have members of - among others - Flesh World and Blank Square among their lineup. Their debut album is already kicking butts in a fully convincing fashion and delivers an adorably excentric sound roughly in the realm of fuzz- & garage punk, hard- & postcore which comes across just as unpolished as it's inventive. The whole thing is somewhat reminiscent of bands like Vexx or Dots, as well as the occasional faint echo of Surfa Rosa-era Pixies. Quality stuff!
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