WHO: Brutal Youth WHAT: Rebuilding Year WHY: Super fast melodic hardcore reminiscent of Kid Dynamite, you say? Sign me up! In these 29 minutes of sing-along fury, Brutal Youth seem to have figured out a formula of what exactly makes this genre work. The hooks, speed, catchy choruses, down-on-your luck lyrics, and barking vocals are all there. Rebuilding Year just sparks joy in its pure craftsmanship. Brutal Youth came out of nowhere for me, and just might have come out...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Porterhouse Records reissue of SC.U.M.’s Born Too Soon LP. Listening to the reissue of Montreal-based punk/hardcore outfit SC.U.M.’s Born Too Soon LP really takes me back. I mean, I understand that the idea of a reissue is supposed to recall a time where the album in question was new and is capable of allowing a listener to inhabit that moment for a while – but the reissue of Born Too Soon...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into The Flatliners’ New Ruin LP. In the twenty-year duration of The Flatliners’ career to date, it’s actually pretty remarkable to observe the turns that the band’s music has taken. After beginning with some respectable (if not terribly memorable) ska-core in 2005 and then taking a couple of years to develop (see how it works with 2007’s The Great Awake), The Flatliners really hit the big time hard with 2010’s classic Cavalcade and...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Gotta Give It Up LP by Sweat. On the surface, the cliche that, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” writes itself into any discussion about Gotta Give It Up. Yes – from the opening notes of “Hit & Run,” the opening cut on Gotta Give It Up, Sweat presents itself like a tight and intense unit – an imposing and very metallic entity which also speeds along at a...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Pretty Garbage LP by Come Closer. While it’s very easy for me to get excited about a new punk band that I’ve never heard before (I’ve been listening to a lot of punk, for a for a lot of years), running across something which makes me excited because I can’t immediately qualify it is instantly attractive because it’s obviously operating within a paradigm I recognize, but there’s something about it that...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Brace Yourself LP by Seized Up. Ever heard an album which hits the mark brilliantly and causes you to remember why you like or got into one particular type of music or another, reader? Brace Yourself, the new album by Seized Up, hit me like that – about half the time while it played. The other half of the albums runtime just had me hoping it would find a way to...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the The Pain, The Blood and The Sword LP by Lion’s Law. There’s a certain comfort which can be found in a record which, while new, sounds familiar. As albums like that play, it can be pretty easy for a listener to sigh as a turntable’s stylus finds its intended groove and each cut seems to spontaneously align and produce an accessible, pleasing sensation for its audience. Now, in the case of...
WHO: Nice Guys WHAT: Self-titled WHY: I’ll gladly say that Nice Guys are the best band in Boston and fight anyone who wants to challenge that. Remember, this isn’t exactly the same band from 5 years ago. They used to stick to the EP format and sounded raw and sloppy as they should being a weedcore band. Nowadays they’re a tight proggy hardcore punk band and have finally bestowed their debut LP on us. It’s punk rock blast, fast, spastic,...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into EP by Dad Brains. Now over forty years since it first appeared, it was inevitable that punk rock was probably going to take on something that resembled a fatherly voice, somehow. How could it not? With Green Day having made concept records already and both Fat Mike Burkett and Mike Watt having produced punk rock opera albums, punk and its pillars have already begun taking on “grown up projects” (or at least...
The funny thing about punk and hardcore bands has always seemed to be that, no matter how caustic they may have sounded when listeners first began paying attention, the desire to get louder/harder/more aggressive as soon as MORE people begin listening to them is nearly immediate. A perfect example of this tradition can be found in the recorded output of Vancouver’s rising stars NEEDS; upon first appearing with their self-titled album in 2015, the band shattered expectations by delivering a...