What started out as a duo fronted by Corey Plumb of Spray Paint fame has now grown into a fully fledged band lineup and accordingly, this new LP marks a further step towards a more airy and organic sound aesthetic for the group, which at this point also sounds the most reminiscent so far of his previous Spray Paint work, especially of their later, heavily electronic-leaning phase. That said, this is far from being a lazy retread of times past, as his trademark dissonant guitar work on here blends in a uniquely natural way with a plethora of pulsating sound both organic and electronic, which on one hand have a distinctly industrial feel to them while quite paradoxically retaining a surprisingly playful and warm quality throughout.
Furious anarcho punk from London that refuses to be neatly filed away in a single genre crate, which is always the most thrilling kind of punk shit anyway. Recorded at New York’s D4MT Labs, this does indeed share some of the hallmarks of that particular place’s most well known export Kaleidoscope and, to a lesser extent, Straw Man Army, while also exposing some overtones of the wider left-field ambitious hardcore spectrum with the likes of early Bad Breeding, Acrylics and Daydream being some of the names coming to mind at first glance.
Following an intoxicatingly strong debut EP last summer, the follow-up by french psychedelic rock wizard Remy Pablo delivers more of that same overwhelming goodness stubbornly executing its very own notion of pulsating loops and blown-out drones at the intersections of psych- and space rock, post-, art-, proto- and garage punk with more than just a little of an MX-80-, Chrome- and Métal Urbain vibe to it.
Even in the face of pretty much anything that loose collective of musicians gathered around the New York label Decoherence Records has done so far, Gay Cum Daddies still stuck out as one of its most baffling agents of chaos and mischief. In a way, their newest LP is almost what you’d expect of this group at this point, an unwieldy bastard made of atonal and chaotic, no-wave-ish noise that, despite all the clutter and cacophony, never seems random. More than ever before, i get a sense of this group being totally in control of their craft at all times, their nerve-racking jams never leaving a trace of doubt that these dudes do indeed have a master plan. A weird, convoluted and disjointed one for sure, but a plan nonetheless. Once you’ve re-wired your brain to almost make sense of it, it feels like the most transgressive and shocking thing ever when Ribboning Boulder Hands Over Data actually has a discernible 4/4 beat playing for, like, a whole 30 seconds.
Excellent debut EP from this San Antonio, Texas group setting off seven blasts of pitch-black yet very much refined post punk. While the opening Track Progress Trap sounds to me as if the garage/noise rock/post punk hybrids of Flat Worms and The Cowboy were being fused to a bit of The Spits or Lost Sounds, the record subsequently settles into an ever slightly shifting aesthetic reminding me of numerous greats of contemporary post punk like Nag, Predator, VR Sex, Tube Alloys, Rank/Xerox, Public Interest and the early works of Institute, Diät und Marbled Eye. While this surely ain’t the apex of originality at this point in time, the group knows how to keep things moving and interesting throughout and most of the time these songs are every bit as good as any of the aforementioned acts.
This Sydney group already stirred up some waves not too long ago with a pair of strong EPs and this newest one is their finest one yet, operating in a golden zone between garage-/synth-/post- and psych punk that kinda bridges the gap between the garage-/post punk melancholia of weird outliers like Die TV and DBR, the garage primitivism of shit á la Buck Biloxi, Giorgio Murderer and the spaced-out psychedelic expanse of Zoids, Mononegatives, Mateo Manic, Silicon Heartbeat, Pow!, Cthtr or even some stretches of Electric Prawns 2’s monumental ’23 album Prawn Static For Porn Addicts.
Having put out a pair of already quite impressive LPs in ’22/’23, the third longplayer of this Hamilton, Ontario act really nails it this time. Following a brief ironic metal-ish intro, right out of the gate The Glove radiates a vibe of MX-80, Chrome and Metal Urbain plus just the slightest touch of The Cramps. This is some first rate fuzz-/garage-/space punk shit right here, weird enogh to keep you on your toes yet also sophisticated enough to keep you engaged, with just the right amount of ear candy sprinkled in like in Corpus Earthling Meets The Counter Culture, where a well-worn catchy standard punk riff gets the over-the top fuzz-excess treatment. Other times and especially in the first couple of tracks, there’s some weird Hawkwind-goes-hair/glam metal energy going on. Just as well though, you might find similar sonic texture in a diffuse cluster of current acts such as Zoids, Thee Hearses, Monoburro, Mateo Manic, Mononegatives or Silicon Heartbeat.
Okay, what have we got here… a London group made up of members of 2010s garage punk mainstays Sauna Youth and Cold Pumas, carrying the seal of quality of the ever-reliable powerhouse labels Feel It Records and Upset The Rhythm… What could possibly go right? Everything, dummy! Sounding unlike any of the aforementioned groups, their debut LP contains some of the most elegant and well-rounded post punk you’re gonna hear this year with some echoes of Pylon and Delta 5, occasional flashes of Television and the early works of Soft Boys and XTC. Equally though, you could at times compare them to more recent groups like Sweeping Promises, Spread Joy or Bodega. Throughout, this has a new wave-ish quality without ever becoming too saccharine or smoothed-out – to the contrary, there’s quite a bit of edge and contour to these tracks, counterbalanced by a lot of warmth and melody to their songs and arrangements, best exemplified by a bunch of catchy quasi-ballads like Peg or Elsie.
This group based in Alicante and Valencia, Spain (previously also known as Disli on their first EP) certainly has upped their game on their newest EP via Flexidiscos, on which comparatively simplistic bursts of hard- and postcore alternate with more elaborate post punk constructions – you never know what’s gonna happen just one song later. All the while, songs like the über-hymn Glamur Interior skillfully counterbalance that trait with plenty of catchy melodic undercurrent and there’s even a touch of Wire-esque psychedelia on the closing track Calambre Exquisito. The opening track, on the other hand, has a bit of a Sauna Youth vibe to it while overall, you might catch some echoes of bands like Pyrex, Waste Man, Sievehead, Tube Alloys, Corker, Rank/Xerox or Criminal Code.
Following a couple of exceptionally enjoyable EPs, this Los Angeles group stays a delightfully quirky enigma on their first full length record, whose often minimalist yet always playful and elaborately constructed bursts of chaos consistently find new ways of wiggling their way out of established genre tropes and conventions and as such, remind me of a whole bunch of different things at different points. What i can say though is that this shit certainly shares a common spirit and tons of that same unshackled creativity with other hyperactive agents of distraction like Reality Group, Patti, Skull Cult, R.M.F.C., Big Bopper, early Uranium Club, Print Head, Subtle Turnhips, Shark Toys, Pressure Pin and Meal.
