There’s a nice gritty Garage Rock intensity to this one. It is in many ways the sound of a very young band finding their feet, and you know what? Sometimes that can be the magic. Coming in cold to the band it’s a record that has the edge of a debut yet of course is the follow up to the rather cool I Wanna Be On TV from 2024 (which i checked out afterwards).
Opener ‘Meet Me on the Floor Tonight is more than enough to grab your attention and ‘I’m bored’ flicks all the right Garage Rock, Stooges meets Strokes/Hives buttons but there’s something more here that’s worth diving deeper.
Even when you’re not sure where a track is headed they somehow managed to set it on fire, the opening of ‘Bright Red Eyes’ sounded a bit ubiquitous, but the song grows under the skin to become a bit of a monster. This is all rather addictive.
The best though might be yet to come, after the riff rock opening of ‘Dirty Fingers’ we get all wonderfully, majestically radio friendly and the meandering ‘A-A-A’ gets all emotionally charged and fierce around the edges. Sonically its all rather exciting and bursting with ideas rather than staying in the lane. There’s Husker Du, Bowie, Stooges, The Hives all fighting in the mix and whilst it might at times be conflicting that is very much the charm.
The ideas are great, the execution is full of energy and the very best thing is the freshness: ‘Radio Baby’ is a nice slice of Punky goodness, and whilst ‘This is a Hippy Killing Device’ may close one door sonically it cements the sound lyrically and musically. I love the almost MC5/Stonsey ‘Come on to Me’ and the flaming rock and roll of ‘Ordinary Man’ is just wonderfully incendiary rock and roll.
Interestingly the closing track ‘The Greyhound Race’ is the most traditional rock Song on here with notes of the 80’s U.K. Alternative Scene. It’s a tantalizing way to leave it hanging. Man I feel young again! How many albums can do that!
If you love the trailblazers – MC5, The Stooges, Velvet Underground and appreciate the latter days sounds of The Hives and The Strokes then grab a slab of modern, yet reverent, punk-infused rock ‘n’ roll. These guys are good. Very good. Probably gonna be huge…
8/10