Following their most ambitious record so far in last year’s Material LP, which expanded the sonic pallette out into the weirder fringes of somewhat Desperate Bicycles-leaning art punk and also featured some of the most infectious power pop songwriting of that year, the newest 7″ by Nick Vicario aka Smirk, who’s also known as a member of Public Eye, Crisis Man und Cemento among others, keeps things comparatively simple and straightforward this time while his heavily sample-backed songs and arrangements still unerringly hit their mark every single time.
I think this is the same band i’ve been yapping about many moons ago.. Their 2016 EP appears to have been completely wiped from the face of the earth and the web though, which is a fucking shame really ‘cos this was good stuff already. But admittedly, this shit is so much better… Melodic punk and garage vibes rule supreme here with more than a little hint of Dickies and some distinct ’77 and power pop flavors that would already make for a perfectly solid EP. What propells this one from good to plain out-of-the-ballpark spectacular though are the advanced songwriting chops on display here, running circles around 99% of all other current punk groups playing simple, straightforward pop tunes. This is truly transcendent, next-level shit, i mean it!
This San Antonio, Texas group delights with a throwback to the most melodic parts of eighties punk, indie- and college rock, clearly informed by the likes of Hüsker Dü, Replacements, Moving Targets, Guided By Voices and Dinosaur Jr. in the more jangly melodic moments, as well as some early Naked Raygun in the straight-ahead rockin’ tunes, all of it held together by frictionless songwriting that wouldn’t feel too out of place with more recent bands á la Booji Boys, Bad Sports, TV Crime or Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys either.
Over the course of the past year or two, San Antonio, Texas group Sex Mex have proven to be a reliable bet with their knack for catchy garage-/synth punk and fuzz pop tunes. Their newest batch doesn’t disappoint either, delivering a pop goodness highly indebted, among other things, to the more melodic end of the Reatard-related universe, Lost Sounds being the most obvious comparison here but also newer shit á la The Gobs, Witch Piss or Ghoulies wouldn’t be too far off.
New stuff from Gee Tee or Vee or whatever, this dude’s shit is all good! On this LP, he’s holding a nice balance between the power pop tendencies of his recent Tee Vee Repairman records and the somewhat more garage-leaning projects of his á la Satanic Togas, Research Reactor Corp. and Set-Top Box, making for another fine batch of fuzzed-out garage pop tunes, among them some of his most infectious ones so far, that’s for sure.
A duo made up of Kimi Recor and Vinny “Vaguess” Earley, you can’t really overlook the similarities to the latter dude’s recorded output but there’s also more going on here. Starting off from a familiar mix of garage- and post punk there’s some clear Lithics kind of energy in some places or Welt Star, another Earley-related project comes to mind while songs like Staring at the Sun and Please 3 sound like forgotten Woolen Men tunes that fell through the cracks somewhere and Chameleon has the vibe of a Digital Leather deep cut from an alternate cold-wave reality.
Not long after the recent 7″ on Goodbye Boozy Records we get the first LP of Sydney’s Tee Vee Repairman on that other garage punk powerhouse label Total Punk. As you might’ve guessed this is another juicy treat of simple and stupid melodic garage punk and power pop delight well suited for fans of shit like Bad Sports, Tommy and the Commies and Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys while of the dude’s own other projects, you might be most reminded of a sugar-coated version of Satanic Togas or recent R.M.F.C..
Class from Tucson, Arizona deliver their strongest release so far via the seemingly infallible Feel It Records. Their whereabouts certainly make The Resonars come to mind and indeed their mastermind Matt Rendon has been involved in the production and further similarities can be drawn in their somewhat british invasion-fueled brand of slightly psychedelic brand of garage rock, jangle- and power pop. Class, however, deal in a way more straightforward and rougher-edged garage punk sound – the overall vibe of Burning Cash wouldn’t feel out of place on the recent Strange Attractor LP.
It took the Bristol group just shy of a year to come up with the newest installment in their, so far, absolutely spectacular and flawless run of (digital) singles. I’m glad to announce that i’ve got nothing new to say about this one – these two tunes are yet another masterclass of melodic post punk and power pop songcraft with clear echoes of Buzzcocks, Television Personalities, Mekons and many more artefacts of predominantly british DIY punk history.
A thoroughly high quality new batch of 7″s and even a CD from the ever reliable italian garage punk institution Goodbye Boozy Records. Tee Vee Repairman is yet another project of Ishka Edmeades who you might also know from acts such as Satanic Togas, Set-Top Box, Research Reactor Corp., Gee Tee, Remote Control, Mainframe… this dude seems to be in pretty much anything out of the Warttman orbit and beyond that. Let’s just say dude’s been’s a constant fixture on this blog in recent years and will sure crop up many more times because everything he touches tends to become instant garage punk and power pop gold. A different beast altogether is the 7″ by Wayne Pain & The Shit Stains, a simple & stupid attack of decidedly oldschool fuzzed-out garage punk with that classic rockabilly edge to it. Speaking of rockabilly… Qinqs have a touch of that going on too, although in their case it reeks less of The Cramps and more of The Fall – The Great White Wonder might as well be called How i re-wrote Elastic Man – as well as more recent occurrences á la Shark Toys, Ex Cult, Parquet Courts or The UV Race. The newest tape by the mysterious Zoids then is another endearingly eccentric treat of minimalist electro-/space-/garage punk transporting more than just a little bit of a Suicide-meets-Metal Urbain / Dr. Mix and the Remix vibe. Also: Yeah, fuck vinyl ‘cos the future belongs to the compact disc bro. Dadgad‘s tracks then serve as the perfect transition between the aforementioned electric space punk stylings and the opposite half of a 7″ featuring – yet again – that dude known as Zhoop… or was it Feed? Djinn? Brundle maybe? I don’t care really it’s all good shit!
