Alrighty, so here's a new Billiam record doing all the awesome tricks a new Billiam record's supposed to do and by now i'm sure you've long since made up your mind about the dude and whether you love or hate his schtick - kinda the musical equivalent to a Wes Anderson flick i guess. I'm firmly in the "love" camp concerning both Billiam and Wes Anderson though and even if they'd both just continue to re-make that exact same kind of film/record for the rest of their lives, i can always take one more of that!
Another mysterious eggpunk bomb has dropped from… well, where in the world actually? Released on a Tel Aviv label, the song titles, as google translate tells me, are apparently portuguese. Then again, sound-wise, the closest reference would probably be the blown-out mayhem of Barcelona genre overlords Prison Affair with further comparisons to be made to Cologne's Nuts, the early works of australian groups á la Set-Top Box, Eugh, Midgee, Research Reactor Corp and, to come full circle eventually, Tel Aviv's own crude eggpunk sensation Victor would fit nicely in there too. So, long story short, this is some premium grade globetrotting shit, regardless of where these folks might actually be located.
Yet another good reference point, then again, would be Charleston, South Carolina's Beer and, speaking of the devil, the world's most beerest beer band has just released their second extended play to which most of what i've just said is gonna apply verbatim so i'm not gonna repeat myself and instead just gonna crank up the good shit and advise you to do the same 'cos i know your neighbors are just gonna love it!
A dense and noisy post punk spectacle unfolds on this Richmond, Virginia group's debut EP, its four elaborately constructed songs making a fully mature and confident impression already. At times this has a curious vibe of, say, Straw Man Army plus a subtle trace of Poison Ruïn while in other places this shit reminds me a lot of some of the past decade's more melancholy and song-oriented post punk acts in the vein of early Estranged, Public Eye, Criminal Code, Bruised, VHS, Waste Man as well as Atlanta heavyweights Wymyns Prysyn and Institute/Mothers's Milk.
It's shaping up to be a pretty awesome week for eggpunk already, helped further along by another genre fixture of the last couple years, Melbourne's Metdog, having just released their full length debut after an impeccable string of EPs and singles. They promised shit about computers and oh boy do we get shit about computers here, leaving more questions than answers though, most of which begin with "What the fuck…?". Perfectly underscoring the subject matter we get to witness the group at their most electronically inclined so far, their overall vibe here being reminiscent of a bizarre 8-bit mashup of vintage Ausmuteants with the distinct added flourish of Windows 3.11 midi files.
Brilliant, thrilling oldschool action on this Philadelphia group's debut EP on which a hybrid garage/hardcore vibe á la Cutters gets fused with a distinct Oi! tendency reminiscent of The Chisel, Chubby And The Gang. Then again, there are some ocurrences of Poison Ruïn-esque riffing to be spotted as well and sometimes the guitar leads operate in classic Radio Birdman territory.
Having first come to my attention via a split tape with AJ Cortes and The Burglars, this group from West Palm Beach, Florida has only gotten stronger with every new release and this one is no exception, delivering a new round of catchy, compact blasts in the somewhat eggy realms of power pop, synth- and garage punk evoking thoroughly favorable comparisons to the likes of Gee Tee, Erik Nervous, Vaguess and Satanic Togas.
Few groups have exemplified the Berlin post punk vibe boiled down to such a pure and defining form as Aus, of whom we're getting the first new tunes in almost four years on this new 7". On this one, the previous two records' rather purist, suffocating bleakness gets opened up just a bit by way of a newfound sense of groove, a much needed propellant and change of pace revealing a plausible way forward for a group that could, at times, feel a bit averse to change.
When Brussels group Warm Exit toured Germany last year few of us, myself included, had anticipated the kind of surprise we'd gonna be in for, although their 2022 TV / Ultra Violence single already hinted at their sound morphing into more of a classic post punk direction. On stage though, it immediately became clear what a radical transformation this group had gone through with barely a speck to be found of their initial sound more in line the current generation of quirky garage-/synth-/eggpunk acts, now replaced by an intense and pitch-black abyss of atmospheric post punk, which is now also reflected on their full length debut, calling to mind a illustrous and diverse array of groups like Rank Xerox, Criminal Code, Diät, Girls In Synthesis, Sievehead or Negative Space.
Cleveland's Knowso for sure have been among the most idiosyncratic and memorable groups of the past couple years. Their newest full length shows them at the height of their strength once again, their amalgamation of post punk, noise- and math rock still coming across just as quirky and whimsical as it is tight, rigid and angular all the same, combining a seemingly procedural and efficient, mathematical approach with an amount of fun and catchyness you wouldn't really expect inside these rough parameters. At this point, their sound is pretty much their own thing but if you absoiutely must compare them to other groups, you might find some similarities to stuff such as Brandy, Landowner, Big Bopper or maybe Nag in their more approachable moments.
Already having a couple EPs under his belt, this Whittier, California dude's first full length cassette, also his first release following over five years of radio silence, immediatley clicks with me. That shit is right up my alley with its endearingly crude, moderately psychedelic mix of garage-, post- and synth punk carrying the traits of so many household names, among them the likes of Mononegatives, Useless Eaters, Die TV, Electric Prawns 2, Beef, early Powerplant, Pow!, Freak Genes and Lost Packages.
