Review
The Hussy
Cement Tomb Mind Control

The Hussy have been banging away in clubs, bars, and basements since 2008. In that time, they’ve pumped out 3 vinyl singles and a split cassette. Still, with their Slow Fizz debut, the question remains about how their hyped-up, dirty garage rock will come across on a longer format.

Cement Tomb Mind Control should alleviate any worries that the short-attention duo wouldn’t hold up over thirteen songs. Sure, it’s barely twenty minutes, but the songs consistently sound different enough from each other, with a lot of credit going toward the album sequencing and the vocal trade-offs between the two band members: guitarist Bobby Hussy and drummer Heather Sawyer. As a boy/girl two-piece there is an easy and inaccurate comparison that comes to mind, but The Hussy’s focus is on loud garage with a bit of sleazy entendre. Over their noisy hooks, Bobby’s vocals tend to be distorted and a bit more orientated towards the groove, whereas Heather uses a more shouty style that is frequently delivered through a call-and-response fashion, as in the song “Pavement,” where Bobby sings the verses, handing off the choral “Now you see it, now you don’t” to Heather. Bobby takes the lead more often than his drumming counterpart, but not by a wide margin. Their vocal styles balance well and give a melodic backbone to some serious cabinet-rattling rock.

It’s hard to single out specific songs on the record—they tend to rush past so quickly, incorporating a catchy rhythm and moving on without settling. For such a manic pace, the record shows surprising cohesion between tracks. They use interludes from answering machines and snippets of dialogue from the recording session to lighten the mood and to give the listener a breather.

The song structures are traditional with simple choruses followed by a repetitive chorus. Meanwhile, the foot-tapping beats never let up as the guitar ranges from jangly garage to balls-to-the-wall sleaze. Every so often, things get a bit repetitive, but the songs fly past so quickly that it doesn’t detract much from the overall energy levels. It’s twenty minutes of loud rock that presents itself as repetitively simple, although closer attention reveals more depth, both lyrically and in the layers of distortion.