Recent reviews

Our latest album reviews, featuring the records we've most enjoyed (or not) over the past few weeks.

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Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)

Biznaga

Gran Pantalla
Slovenly (2020)

Gran Pantalla is the third LP from Spain’s Biznaga. It’s predecessor, Sentido Del Espectáculo, was quite successful in Spain and numero tres comes with the lofty promise in the press material as “If Joe Strummer were actually from Granada, The Clash would have sounded something like this.” It’s also the band’s first record featuring collaborative songwriting, instead of each writer contributing their own material along the journey.Of course it doesn’t live up to The Clash, because that’s just silly. But for somebody with an elementary grasp of the Spanish language and an ear for The Clash, I do enjoy this.Gran Pantalla translates to “Big Screen.” This pulls from many, many sources. It’s almost always forward-moving and energetic. It’s not high strung or concise, necessarily, but with a clear trajectory. It’s has that unspoken “headed for the finish line” vibe of a band like The Marked Men, though few sonic similarities. Musically I’d say it fits somewhere in the middle between The Clash (I had to) and modern, midtempo anthemic sounds like The Menzingers – it’s ’77 punk without the crunchy guitars. It’s familiar, but never derivative or predictable. It fits the punk template, but with extra flourish and variety. In … Read more

All Hits

Men And Their Work
Iron Lung (2020)

Back in the 1980s there were some intriguing new sounds developing. Post-punk was always arty and a bit noisier, but … Read more

Big Chungus

Big Chungus
Wet Cassettes Records (2020)

You have to appreciate a concept that’s primarily focused on making you uncomfortable; where’s the fun without a healthy dose … Read more

Left Hand Black

Left Hand Black
Wolverine records (2020)

Back when I was listening to everything with the stamp Horrorpunk on it I discovered a band called The Dead … Read more

Broadway Calls

Sad in the City
Red Scare Industries (2020)

Sad in the City doesn’t mince words. Opening with the lines of “If my country collapses/ can I crash on … Read more

Era Bleak

Era Bleak
Dirt Cult (2020)

It’s really tough for me to review this full-length. Why? Because I loved the band’s demo tape and it’s really … Read more

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One from the archives

Fucked Up

Year of the Pig
Whats Your Rupture? (2007)

Fucked Up are on intimate terms with ambiguity. It's a rare virtue, since as a rule rock bands tend to seek the comfort of ham-fisted moralism or an apathy either hard-partying or self-pitying. But like Sylvia Plath circa Ariel or the earliest punk bands, Fucked Up stamp their works with an intimidating and sometimes uncomfortable symbolic resonance, leaving it to the listener to sort through the barbed signifiers. For some, it's a revelation; for others, it's condemned as pretension or irresponsibility, since it doesn't—as rock music often has since the late 1960s—provide an answering chorus for the listener's own tenuous, rickety belief systems: too much "Belsen Was a Gas," not enough "Nazi Punks Fuck Off." It's a bit like playing with a loaded gun, but that's also part of the … Read more

More album reviews

Hyborian

Volume II (2020)
Season of Mist (2020)

Hyborian is balls to the wall raw sludge metal hailing from Kansas City, Missouri. Volume II is their third album and what feels like a overall continuation from their previous record, Volume I. From the very beginning of the 8 song, 40 minute masterpiece is the song Driven by Hunger which gives you a perfect taste of what the rest … Read more

The Lawrence Arms

Skeleton Coast
Epitaph (2020)

When a band is releasing its third new record since 2006, you’d expect some inconsistency. The Lawrence Arms seem to be timeless though. With Skeleton Coast they pick right up where they left off Metropole (2014). Take the opening stanza of “Dead Man’s Coat” as an example. Beginning with Chris McCaughan’s soft and wanting melodies, it’s unmistakably The Lawrence Arms. … Read more

King Buzzo w/ Trevor Dunn

Gift of Sacrifice
Ipecac (2020)

Simon and Garfunkel.Seals and Crofts.Hall and Oates.Captain and Tennille.Some artists just go together. Sure, they might make music on their own. But once they find their “other”, their “person” - you never want to hear them with anyone else.Such is the case the case with Buzz Osbourne and Trevor Dunn. So long Melvins and Fantômas. So long Mr. Bungle and … Read more

Chain Whip

14 Lashes
Drunken Sailor (2020)

This is the kind of hardcore that makes my throat hurt just listening. It’s also the kind of hardcore where I can’t sit still while listening, even when tethered to headphones at work. It’s high energy, relentless and, somehow, it just never lets up. To keep coining silly phrases, this is sweaty, gasp-for-air hardcore. As each of the songs fade … Read more

Old Ghosts

Crow
State of Mind (2020)

These last few weeks I've started to notice that the creases in my forehead are deepening. It's a subtle change to my face, but it's progressively becoming more noticeable. My pores are becoming more visible as well, and my skin doesn't have the same spongey, moist quality to it that I remember it having in my early twenties. And of … Read more

Inject the Light

The Apocalypse Is Boring
Dirt Cult (2020)

Inject the Light is a time capsule, a one-person project from Chris Mason that’s about living in the moment of the COVID-19 lockdowns. Mason, who has also plays with Low Culture and Macho Boys, among others, takes a new approach here. This five-song digital release is a little on the lo-fi side, with elements of New Wave, No Wave, synth … Read more

Raging Nathans

Oppositional Defiance
Rad Girlfriend Records (2020)

Boy do The Raging Nathans know how to start a record on a down note. The band plays melodic DIY pop-punk that’s of the verse-chorus-verse variety with driving rhythm to give it that extra oomph. While I tend to think of this kind of music as a little more light-hearted, the band cuts through that veneer instantly with “Tragedy Ghouls: … Read more

Sun-0-Bathers

Floater EP
Morning Wood Records/Thousand Islands Records/Paper + Plastick (2020)

Two years ago I reviewed Local Warming, the debut EP by Sun-0-Bathers. Two years have passed, but not much has changed for Sun-0-Bathers. I am not going to blame them for it. If you have a winning formula, why change it, right?That winning formula for Sun-0-Bathers is straightforward 90’s skatepunk. Summer is the best time for releases of this type … Read more

Sanctifying Ritual

Sanctifying Ritual
Iron Bonehead (2020)

Most death metal bands exhibit a morbid quality to their sound but few would be believed if they said that their music was actually recorded in a catacomb. However, if the German death-thrash thrallers Sanctifying Ritual confessed as much to me, that their raw and cavernous debut was recorded in such an odious environment, it would be a sheer act … Read more

Einstürzende Neubauten

Alles in Allem
Potomak 2020 (2020)

It’s a fairly long story as to the exact circumstance, but a couple of years ago on a rainy winter day in Tasmania I found myself as the only passenger in a shuttle bus when just when we were about to depart, the door opened and three constituents of the Einstürzende Neubauten entered the vehicle. While their World War I … Read more

Skeleton

Skeleton
20 Buck Spin (2020)

There are a lot of skeletons out there. Stuffed in closets. Hanging on metal hooks in medical school classrooms. There is a skeleton in me writing this. And there is a skeleton in you reading it. If you think about all of those sharp, calcified rods and lobes, shifting below tender, malleable flesh, it might unsettle you somewhat. There has … Read more

Sam Russo

Back To The Party
Red Scare Industries (2020)

Anytime it’s just one person on the stage, the music being created is going to be intimate and personal. Sometimes it’s so personal that it doesn’t bridge the gap from the stage to the floor. Fortunately, Sam Russo isn’t one of those artists. When he sings, you know it’s about his own life experiences, but it sounds like it’s coming … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Broadway Calls

Meet Me On The Moon
Red Scare Industries (2020)

Meet Me On The Moon is a teaser single for the new LP, Sad In The City, which also happens to be Broadway Calls’ first new full-length in almost a decade (which will release close to the time this review publishes). While I knew of the band, I’d never really spent any time with their records. On this short-player, I … Read more

Mutant Reavers

Monster Punk
Wolverine records (2020)

Back in the late nineties I started listening to horrropunk. To this day it is one of my favourite scenes. Back in the day I listened to basically everything I could find that would match the description horrorpunk. Nowadays I am more picky. Still, if I see a promo mentioning horrorpunk I am so tempted to review it. I’ve skipped … Read more

Reviews by score
Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)