This new collection of alleged b-grade material from one of Melbourne's prime instigators of noisy garage-/hardcore punk chaos is yet another solid proof that you can't ever go wrong with this group, as for much of this EP i absolutely can't see why these tunes wouldn't have made the cut for a "regular" release. Well, one man's trash is another man's treasure i guess and i'm just having a glorious time diving into in this neat little dumpster of leftover scraps.
Now these chaps are from Spain yet their sound rather makes me think a whole bunch of predominantly french bands, their sound sitting inbetween the coordinates of post punk and -core, melodic garage punk and Oi!, calling to mind the likes of Youth Avoiders, Telecult, Nightwatchers, Bleakness and, most recently, Distance or the french-singing Leipzig, Germany group Laxisme. It would thus be easy to dismiss this as yet another artifact of a recently quite ubiquitous subgenre but that would be kinda unfair and discounting what a massive fireworks of powerful hooks this way-above-average record is setting off from beginning to end.
This Montreal group's previous two EPs were already each a fat bucket chock-full of sleazy-ass rock'n'roll bliss and now they really hit it out of the ballpark with their first full-length effort, on which they considerably expand their stylistic color gamut and dial up the catchyness to eleven of their already dangerously combustive recipie made up of garage punk, hard- and postcore elements, a slight hint of Oi! and lots unapologetic dabbling in sweaty '70s hard & heavy dad rock territory while in tunes like Never Enough, there's an undeniable hint of roots-y folk- and cowpunk going on aswell. Immediately this shit strikes me a bit as a significantly dumbed down version of that recent Punter LP and further reminds me of a colorful bunch of sleazecore acts á la Cement Shoes, Golden Pelicans, Flea Collar, Cülo, Cutters, Polute and Chain Whip.
Melbourne's Metdog have absolutely cemented their status as one of the major players of the contemporary garage-/synth-/eggpunk scene with last year's pretty fucking gaga full length Questions and Answers Regarding Computers and Screens. For their newest LP though, they dial down the overall weirdness ever-so-slightly, which i'm gonna say is actually for the better as i think another iteration of that '90s PC- / early web-themed insanity and ultra-cheesy general MIDI-esque sonics certainly wouldn't hit quite as hard the second time around. Instead we get a somewhat more streamlined and straightforward bunch of alarmingly catchy garage tunes that still let their freak flag fly aplenty, just in case you were worried things might get even remotely too serious here. Anyway, it's certainly their most substantial release so far, supported by a matching growth in the songwriting department without giving up too much of the group's overall playfulness and unpredictability.
There's more going on under the hood than first meets the eye on this Budapest group's debut cassette whose eight tunes on one hand - especially in its first half - channel some vaguely oldschool-ish KBD- and garage punk vibes with alternating flourishes of Gun Club and Wipers, counterbalanced by a bunch of way more contemporary sounding elements on which groups of the current anarcho-/postcore-axis á la Straw Man Army and Fantasma have surely left their mark while at many other points, a certain breed of art punk melancholy akin to, say, Kitchen's Floor and Uniform (Atlanta, not NYC) also shines through.
For the follow-up to their excellent 2023 EP Feed The Clones Pt. 1 - which has been their first record to fully realize their potential IMO - the Oakland group can't be bothered to tweak their specific formula a whole lot, just as the "part 2" designation would already suggest. That's fine with me 'cos there wasn't anything broken with their sound to begin with and much of the song material collected on here is top notch shit once again - even though, admittedly, this thing sometimes feels more like an EP's worth of hits wedged inbetween a good deal of more sluggish, abstract, atmospheric tunes this time around, much of which i'm tempted to classify as glorified interlude material. Nonetheless, this is yet another essential listen for connoisseurs of demented, Spits-flavoured horror-/garage-/synth punk fodder.
Right on the heels of the Billiam & Busted Head Racked collab EP more excellent shit keeps rolling in already of egg-ish australian garage punk's prime driving force and it's a neat little gimmick indeed to put a five-minute track on one side of a 7" and five one-minute tracks on the other. Naturally, this is yet another kickass bunch of six catchy-as-fuck hits including an explosive Ausmuteants cover tune, but the biggest surprise on here is actually how admirably that aforementioned five-minute song format is working out here. Dude should try that more often! Longpunk or shortpunk? The proper answer is yes, please!
New Gobs! What's left to say about them? If you didn't know about them before, now you do! These Olympia, Washington-based folks absolutely solidify their status as the current kings of fuzzed-out noisy hi-speed lo-fi no-frills garage punk smashers all over again with yet another set of exquisitely explosive sonic weapons.
Portland's Yacht Fire absolutely killed it with last year's self-titled debut EP of cool-as-fuck DIY fuzzed-out garage punk that alternated between quite catchy and utterly abrasive tunes. The successor now transports the same awesomeness while slightly expanding on the folk-ish vibes already subtly present on the first EP, now taking center stage most notably in Run and Kiss Off, while Nod and Cigarettes are punchy no-frills bursts of simple and effective fuzz punk mayhem and the closing tune Werewolf keeps hitting hard too with a bit of a Wipers-meet-Dead Moon vibe. This is yet another all-killer record by a band you should absolutely keep a eye on!
The tireless Leipzig scene strikes again with yet another quality bunch of eggpunk tunes roughly in the vein of a less distorted Prison Affair, Beer, Egg Idiot or Research Reactor Corp.. Sure, don't expect anything new or groundbreaking here but this shit still packs plenty of a familiar quirky punch and tons of a reliable, if - at this point - kinda basic and no longer terribly original kind of fun.
