There are those kinds of bands lacking a rigid quality control and those that don’t, wisely leaving the lesser takes on the cutting room floor. And then there’s that rare third kind that’s seemingly not in need of any amount of quality control ‘cos pretty much anything they create seems to turn into instant gold. This new collection of unreleased shit that accumulated in the trash bin of formerly Orlando-, now apparently Portland-based garage-/synth-/eggpunk institution Cherry Cheeks makes a thorougly convincing case for them belonging into that latter category as even the scraps, odds and ends they came up with so far are the kind of material other groups should be jealous for really, making for an admittedly weirder, more cluttered and fragmented but by no means less thrilling and energizing listening experience!
The Minneapolis group’s debut EP bursts onto the scene with a fully formed and -realized vision, dabbling in a lovingly oldschool and timeless set of flashbacks to the more left-field staples of ’80s-’90s US postcore and -punk. Lap It Up kicks things off with some kind of ’90s AmRep-meets-Touch&Go pastiche, then suddenly develops into more of a Dischord-like soundscape most reminiscent of Rites Of Spring and early Nation Of Ulysses. In Untitled / Back Inside, the likes of Mission Of Burma, Wipers, Moving Targets and Volcano Suns loom large in addition to some overtones of Bitch Magnet… before eventually seguing into some Angst- and Dinosaur Jr.-esque folk-ish strumming. Freak Disease then gets wedged inbetween grungy ’90s alternative- or even outright cock rock territory and some postcore flourishes you rather might expect at the slow end of the Drive Like Jehu, Jawbox or ’90s Gray Matter spectrum. Life Takes Time then has more of that distinct Burma vibe but i also can’t help but be reminded of Really Red and Saccharine Trust.
This group from Newcastle, Australia delivers five first-rate new blows of electrically driven, vaguely egg-ish and noisy high-energy garage punk shit on their first EP, sure to evoke a nervous twitch or two in those already familiar with such phenomena like S.B.F., Kerozine, Factory City Children, Witch Piss, Cthtr, Feeding Tube, The Gobs or Liquid Face… ‘cos this shit is every bit as good.
It may sound a bit underwhelming on paper what this Melbourne group does on their newest EP, which is a classic brand of new wave-ish post punk seemingly drawing much inspiration from some of the usual suspects such as early Siouxsie, Pylon, XTC, Delta 5 and Gang of Four, but this shit certainly gets elevated by their raw ability at crafting equally catchy, elaborate and carefully balanced tunes of their own, which most obviously will evoke comparisons to fairly recent acts of the Sweeping Promises, The Missed, Marcel Wave and Display Homes kind but i’d also say there’s some of the creative chaos and big-screen drama of early Protomartyr in there, most notbly in …In Ruins, while the melodic closing track A Fireplace evokes the melancholia of that very same group’s later material.
Four instances of altogether competent garage punk with plenty of psychedelic overtones on the debut EP by this group from Amsterdam, Netherlands, which would fit in nicely with a number of mostly previous-decade acts like Sauna Youth, Hamer, Ex-Cult, Clamm and Shitty Life… also add to that a bit of grimy post punk á la Constant Mongrel in Isolation.
Their shit just keeps getting better all the time! Following a very recent EP that showed some considerable growth especially in terms of songwriting, this new one of spain’s chief purveyors of catchy egg-ish noise pop and garage punk pulls that same trick off flawlessly once again, with the first three tracks delivering their trademark melodic dopamine flashes in the most forceful manner we’ve heard of them yet. The melancholy middle track Vuelan Buitres then initiates a slight change of pace with the remainder of these songs going in a somewhat lighter and more playful, yet no less enchanting, direction.
The newest EP by Stockholm’s Kerosene Kream presents their vision at its most realized yet, largely leaving the scrappy eggpunk vibes of their previous EPs behind and moving towards a more psych-leaning variant of garage punk that constantly oscillates between a more innocent, love-and-peace-y UK-style psychedelia and a way darker, more US-centric, drugged-out acid rock sound, overall a mixture of flourishes you might suspect from groups like Pow!, Mononegatives or, very recently, Electric Prawns 2. At times the songwriting might strike you as somewhat basic as tunes like Mindkiller and Psychedelic Ranger are about as close as you can get to what you might call a “traditional” in this genre but hey, you can’t argue with the results. The shit just works.
The demo by these californians sets off four maximally rough and dirty blasts of garage-leaning and noise-infested hardcore punk channaling more than just a bit of an unhinged Lumpy and the Dumpers and The Mentally Ill-like quality that kinda makes you wanna take a shower immediately. In other words: No-frills prime entertainment for the unbalanced und ill-adjusted soul.
Two young dutch garage punk upstarts who’ve already proven their potency over the past year-and-change join forces on this neat little split EP. Haarlem troublemakers Achterlicht give us two more of their rather quirky egg-ish synth punk goodness only for Utrecht’s No Brains to easily one-up them in terms of energy, exchanging some of the previous LP’s eighties Naked Raygun-style riffing for a more abrasive garage punk vibe which i think suits them perfectly here.
This is some top-notch, stimulating new shit on the full-length debut of this Raleigh, North Carolina group, hovering somewhere around the rough coordinates of noise-infused post-, garage- and synth Punk. Grim and furious throughout but nonetheless filled to the brim with catchy hooks, this stuff positively reminds me of such respectable forces as Freak Genes, Isotope Soap, Broken Prayer, Powerplant, Kerozine, Cthtr, Beef and S.B.F..
