In September 2021, Turn Cold’s debut EP ‘Break Your Faith’ introduced a band with a lot of spirit and a very old school approach to almost everything. Their combination of a riff heavy sound and no-frills production style had much in common with many second division thrash bands from the late 80s, and for many, that was enough to suggest this was a band with a lot of potential.
Category Archives: Album & EP Reviews
HARD TIMES – Little Satan EP
Coming out of a pandemic lockdown and determined to make some noise, five guys from Europe hit upon a new musical idea. Members of punk band Suicide Generation teamed up with guys from Desperate Fun and Lysergics and took a musical detour. Hard Times was born with the idea of casting aside their punky pasts, and instead paying homage to glam rock, sleaze rock, and even the proto-glam rock ‘n’ roll of New York Dolls. It is a job that their debut EP ‘Little Satan’ does brilliantly in its own no-frills and semi lo-fi way.
VYPERA – Eat Your Heart Out
Vypera, a melodic metal band from Sweden, began life in 2016 as Madhouse, a covers band working the local circuit. On the basis of their debut release under the new name – their first to feature all new, self penned material – you might find yourself wondering if they were better when hammering through other peoples’ hits, since the bulk of ‘Eat Your Heart Out’ is…fairly bad, to put it mildly.
Sweden have a great track record for rock and metal exports, and the Scandinavians have more than shown an easy knack for great riffs and choruses over the years, very much providing a strong backbone for the melodic rock and metal scene. On on the basis of this debut, though, as much as some people would like to purport such a notion that the Swedes are infallible, such talents aren’t guaranteed. Although the bulk of this debut rehashes some old style riffs fairly solidly, Vypera’s song writing isn’t amazing; the record’s production values are decidedly average, and vocally, seventy five percent of the time, an ugly voice derails most of the good elements there might have been. Faced with something that sounds like polished demo with half of the guitars sounding really trebly, as if they’re bleeding in from another room, it’s immediately hard on the ears.
THE CHASE – Not The F*cking Game Show EP
Indie rockers The Chase began issuing digital singles in 2018. Over the course of the next three years – and amid a global pandemic – they kept up an online presence by drip feeding their audience new material sporadically, one track at a time. Each new tune seemed to suggest bigger and better things, leading to high hopes for a full release somewhere down the track. With gigs back on the table for many bands by the beginning of 2022, things started to fall into place, and The Chase eventually released their debut EP, ‘Not The F*cking Game Show’ in May.
THE DIRTY TRUCKERS – The Tisbury Joneser
The release this album in 2022 marks the end of a decade long silence from Boston rockers The Dirty Truckers. It’s not that the band members have been absent in that time, of course: frontman Tom Baker has released enjoyable works, both solo and with his other band, The Snakes (also featuring the Truckers’ John Brookhouse); guitarist Tad Overbaugh released a solo album in 2015, and drummer John Lynch released a truckload of material with his “other” band, Watts. In addition, an excellent digital compilation, ‘Second Dose’, also provided potential new fans with a handy recap. Whichever way you approach it, the Truckers left their fans with plenty to enjoy during the lengthy sabbatical.