Following 2018’s ‘Posterity’s Sake’, Protected Left’s 2019 EP ‘Fossil’ combines fierce riffs with personal commentary to create a five tracker that should appeal to fans of Propagandi and of the noisiest end of Strike Anywhere catalogue. In terms of thrash oriented punk, it feels a little generic but there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, especially when played as well as it is here.
What would happen if you allowed the drummer from garage punk band Wirms a completely free rein to record whatever he wanted with some friends? You’d get a cassette of punk noise, showcasing a handful of songs that take a loose and childish inspiration from various film titles. …And he’d then decide that Musclegoose would make a fitting name.
Bonkers.
A year on from Redbait’s debut EP ‘Red Tape’, their follow-up release ‘Cages’ presents the St. Louis hardcore band in an especially confronting mood. Given the state of the world at the time of release that’s hardly surprising, but even so, the EP’s opening number ‘Capital Gains’ is particularly sharp and aggressive even by their previous standards. In a seventy five second howl of rage, the band move through several aggressive styles, each one clearly showing a band that’s not to be messed with…and certainly not about to take things lying down. A huge buzz of bass feedback instantly signifies something great is afoot and within seconds, the track explodes into a slab of crust-punk fury with a message that’s particularly pointed as the band calls for a “working class liberation” for “all ages, all races, all genders and all wage earners”. This is hard to gauge without a trusty lyric sheet, of course, but between a furious vocal performance that mixes hardcore shouts and black metal inflections seamlessly, a brief instrumental breakdown leaning towards more of a metal sound and a huge climax featuring male and female voices absolutely screeching, this is a powerful opening statement for fans and first-timers alike.
Man-Eaters are a hardcore punk band bringing together ex-members of Culo and Bleeding Gums. As you might expect from that heritage, their debut cassette isn’t light and frothy, or yet another release by an identikit pop-punk/Ramonescore act. Throughout its half-dozen tracks, speed is of the essence; but more than that, this Chicago quartet brings a vast amount of musical power to their work, creating an EP of adrenaline charged ugliness that’ll almost definitely appeal to lovers of Motorhead, Speedealer and early Electric Frankenstein.
Not to be confused with the American AOR band fronted by Marcie Free in the late 80s, this twenty first century Signal play very ragged hardcore punk. The band’s rhythm section once comprised two thirds of the lo-fi garage punk combo The Meltaways and if you were ever a fan of that band, then Signal’s brash stance should very much appeal.