Perkele are back with a new album out with Spirit of the Streets and I listened and reviewed the new record for our zine.
The Swedes surprised not only me, but many old fans with the single and the video they released prior to the record called One Day. The chorus of the song is good, but I had to re-check the line-up to see if it is the same guys playing. It is not generally bad when band changes style and evolves in its existence, but some bands just don`t fit into that category and Perkele are definitely one of them. They gained a lot of fans during the years with their melodic, but streetsmart version of punk. This new album contains 10 songs, but the sound of the band is now just to metalic. Yes, the early recordings where also metalized, but this new sound just doesn`t suits me as a listener. The guitar solos are too often and too many, the galloping metal riffs are also too often and I wondered if it is Iron Maiden or Perkele apart from the trademark vocals. Not all is black, there are some awesome songs on the record like Miss U or Stand By You, but the other bad songs like the cheesy ballad Mistakes and others are just too many to make this album a keeper. Listen to yourself and decide I gave it a spin for many times and still it`s bad.
Hailing from Edmonton area, Canada, these guys took the scene by storm delivering a blast bomb with their material mixing skatepunk and thrash metal delivering one soundscape that is a whirlwind of melody, energy, guitar driven madness and positivity. This e.p. contains 5 songs of mainly blistering fast, guitar shredding songs with screaming, yet fine melodic vocals that are fitting just nicely into the song structures. For me Predator and the title track are somehow the songs that stand out more above the rest of the material on this record, but don´get me wrong, the whole e.p. is just perfect if you love your skatepunk delivered with metalic technical precision, smart solutions in the songs, great melody and force drive. The band is on European tour this spring, so be sure to catch them somewhere live because I can only imagine how this might sound live, I get goosebumps on my skin immediately.
Blowfuse are punkrock band from Barcelona, Spain formed in 2013. I am happy that I listened and reviewed their new album for our zine. The album is out with Morning Wood Records.
These guys have been famous for their ferocious live energetic shows playing more than 250 shows and becoming one of the most important younger Spanish punkrock bands. This new record contains 11 anthems of melodic punk. Don˙t expect your usual fast skatepunk Nofx style here, this material is much more complex than that. There are many influences with Blowfuse music, mainly skatepunk, but also garage punk, hardcore and even indie noisy stuff. There are fast songs like awesome Dreams or Grand Golden Boy, punk anthems like Angry John, for me one of the highlights of the album, but this album also has one of the best lyrical side of things in a long time. It is too much to say that this is a concept album, but all of the songs talk about little stuff you have to do every day to survive in this rough and ugly modern world, battling with depression and anxiety packed into smart lyrics I can relate to. The vocals are also important for me in such bands and these guys have specific voiced singer which made me love this band even more. This is a great modern punk album!
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 