Here's a kickass holdover from last week that i failed to give a fair shake until now and honestly, i should have known better as finnish noise rock groups actually have had a pretty strong track record in recent years and beyond the obligatory comparisons to early Shellac and Rapeman, the next best thing i can come up with are indeed two other fellow Helsinki-based groups, Fun and Baxter Stockman and i'm sure you can picture my non-surprise upon learning that members of both groups are featured in this trio aswell. To a lesser extent, there's also a bit of Jawbox or Jesus Lizard here and there and you wouldn't be totally off either to find commonalities with more recent US acts like Multicult, Help, Hoaries or maybe Germany's own Trigger Cut.
That Evinspragg record has garnered the most publicity of the newest Inscrutable Records batch for several reasons, some of them justifiable, others more annoyingly drama-related. But to be perfectly honest, that one is a bit too ambitious for its own good in my humble opinion and a bit of a mixed bag which starts out incredibly strong, then kinda fizzles out towards the end and i actually feel much more drawn towards the label's other two releases among which is this full-length debut by Johnny Skin. On it, they create a dreamy, melancholy and super-catchy melange blending the yearning vibe of '50s-'60s bubblegum pop ballads with rudimetary, minimalist lo-fi vintage electronic drum beats and synths in a fashion that's gonna draw inevitable comparisons to Suicide and Métal Urbain, interspersed with a bunch of more noisy and dissonant no wave-ish tunes more in the vein of noisy synth punk pioneers á la Primitive Calculators or Nervous Gender and the experimental, psychedelic sounds of Theoretical Girls, Chrome or MX-80.
It's been another couple of incredible weeks for more-or-less hardcore-related noises so here are four more picks i find particularly notable, in a spectrum progressively moving from the more punk-ish ends towards the unapologetically metal-embracing realms of the genre. For starters we have a brand new tape by Dublin, Ireland group Flower Power who deliver five forceful punches of rough-ass lo-fi ruckus that appears to stand with one foot in the legacy of left-field hardcore shit á la early Flipper, Broken Talent, Noxious Fumes or more recently, Soupcans, Stinkhole and Vulture Shit, with the other firmly planted in oldschool KBD-style artifacts of the Mentally Ill, Endtables and Executives breed, combining hardcore energy with garage punk drive. A much more grim mood then emanates from the tunes of Leeds, England group Mother Nature, whose punk attacks have plenty of a post punk-ish, death rock-y, noise rock-ing vibe to them that reminds me of such acts as Acrylics, earlier Bad Breeding and the australians Arse. Cheap Heat of Schenectady, New York had already made quite an impact with their excellent 2022 demo and on their new EP, they pick up the threads right where they left them off, with a sound that mixes hardcore with a generous plundering of motörpunk, sleaze rock and speed metal, resulting in an overal aesthetic not entirely dissimilar to such groups as Cülo, Cement Shoes, Tarantüla and Polute. Last but not least we have the most metal-leaning group of the whole bunch, Dart from Oulu, Finland, who are the latest entry into a developing canon of bands working on rehabilitating the reputational damage of sounds on the intersection of hardcore and metal by recognizing the punk rock inside of metal, rather than clumsily forcing generic metal elements upon punk rock. The result, as you might have guessed, is drenched in tons of straightforward, oldschool NWOBHM energy and may please oldschool metalheads as much as it will fans of punk acts á la Poison Ruïn, Punter, Ninth Circle, Polute, Hög and Steröid.
As they already did with their brilliant 2023 demo, Toronto's Zero Bars once again show off a considrable force located on the overlapping regions of garage punk, hard- and postcore on their latest EP, with plenty of an old-timey Hot Snakes vibe working in conjunction with bits and pieces from more recent groups like Ascot Stabber, Flowers Of Evil, Piss Test, Nervosas and Mystic Inane among many others.
I somehow skipped over the previous Monda LP here so i take this newest EP as an opportunity to remind you that this Totowa, New Jersey dude is still around and doing cool shit all along the way, with his newest one being the most catchy and straightforward release in a while, consisting of five undeniable earworms between the rough coordinates of oldschool indie rock, garage punk and power pop that more often than not radiates a melancholy, dreamy atmosphere. High quality shit as usual, this time around reminding me quite a bit of Cincinnati power pop overlords Vacation.
Oslo group Molbo sure have made some waves recently with their two cassettes in 2023/'24 which got a huge boost when they got reissued together on vinyl earlier this year via Erste Theke Tonträger. Their overall sound hasn't changed considerably since then but nonetheless there's plenty of refinement evident here, consolidating their style into a more robust and consistent whole while once again weaving threads of garage-, post- and egg punk, death rock and dungeon punk into a pretty fucking inventive and gloriously deformed genre bastard, fortifying and defending their own little niche in the contemporary egg/dungeon canon.
Their newest EP is hands-down the strongest effort so far of this Indianapolis group, who seemingly have left behind the more straightforward rockin' sounds of previous releases and dialed down the energy level considerably for a comparatively relaxed style of garage rock taking many cues from Paisley Underground-ish jangle pop and british psychedelia. And what can i say, they have carefully crafted the tunes to prove they mean business and aren't fucking around here. It's a consistently classy treat of laid-back psychedelic pop that's catchy as fuck without ever running the risk of becoming too saccharine, a bit like a mixture of, say, Good Flying Birds and White Fence, or maybe also an even calmer version of recent power pop goodness á la Shrapnel and Dumbells.
What kind of a lame week would this be without some new eggpunk release? This Indianapolis group has us covered, playing a rather basic but nonetheless fun and rock-solid variant of the genre, finding their own sweet spot somewhere inbetween the likes of early Prison Affair, Deebeat Ramone, Beta Máximo, Midgee, Goblin Daycare and Winky Frown. Shit just works, no complaints here.
Finally! Here it is, the first longplayer of Sydney's Gordo Blackers a.k.a. Steröid who's previously also had a hand in groups like Draggs and Gee Tee among others. A good three years after their debut EP blew a brand new hole into the castle walls of lo-fi egg- and dungeon punk, their sound remains a completely singular and yet strikingly simple affair, mixing the quirky fun of garage- and eggpunk with the catchy hooks and riffing of early eighties metal and arena rock. The result is a potent and intoxicating concoction so addictive it shouldn't be legal really. As usual with anything even remotely metal-related, i'm kinda ill-equipped to make any specific assumptions about musical roots and influences at least on the metal side of things, so i'm gonna stay in my lane here and just say that these tunes fuckin' rip without exception and the second half of this record is a welcome change of pace after the more straightforward, breathless hit marathon of side a, when the stylistic parameters become a good bit more varied, elaborate and adventurous, all of which is presented here in an ultra-dry no-frills mid-fi recording aesthetic that clears and tightens things up considerably compared to the earlier EP without watering anything down. Yup, that shit sounds absolutely fucking perfect if you ask me!
This group from Olympia, Washington has always been an exquisite thrill ride with their two previous EPs and an LP, all of which came out via the reliably excellent cassette label Impotent Fetus. Following a vinyl reissue of said LP via Sorry State Records, that very same label now presents us with their second album and as expected, their hyperactive mix of art- and garage punk, hard- and postcore is yet another delightfully overwhelming assault on the senses equally unpredictable, smart and elaborate, somewhat reminiscent of old left-field hardcore acts like Tragic Mulatto (most strikingly in Failed Experiment), Really Red and Saccharine Trust on one hand but just as related to more recent phenomena like Mystic Inane, Warm Bodies, Launcher, Vexx, Rolex, Cucuy or Big Bopper.
