Category Archives: Reviews

Reviews, Various

(record review)ASTPAI-“True Capacity”(Shield Recordings)

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Austrian punkrock scene is awesome with the awesome bands like Deadends or Missstand melting our faces off. Now it is time for another legendary Austrian punkrock band ASTPAI to grace the pages of this webzine. “True Capacity” is their new album on Shield Recordings and I listened and reviewed it for this webzine.

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Astpai played their debut live show back in 2001.and since then, this is their sixth studio album and the guys continue to amaze their fan base all over the world with their heartfelt, emotional punkrock with hardcore, some rock and post hardcore influences. This record contains 10 songs. As I said, there are some rock n roll influences to the songs like I heard in “Lottery”. For me, one of the best songs on this record is “No Hero” with beautiful lyrics and melodies about love being strong word that we use so often without meaning it unfortunately. This music is intense, emotional, cathartic and made from fans for the fans. Astpai music lies more in the punkrock reaches of The Menzingers, Nothington and similar bands, than fast skatepunk bands. Nonetheless this is an awesome record that I enjoy to listen. Other songs that stand out for me from the others are “Feel Your Pain” and “Wear and Tear” for which the video was made which you can watch below the review. I can˙t wait to catch these guys playing live somewhere. They played my country Croatia before but I just never went to their show. I am planning to correct that mistake very soon. Awesome record to clean you of bad thoughts, make your sadness easier, make you smile with hope and enjoy the beauty of punkrock!

9/10

https://www.facebook.com/ASTPAI/

https://www.facebook.com/shieldrecordings/

Reviews, Various

(record review)STREET DOGS-“Stand for something or die for nothing”

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In these last few years we are missing some plain street punk, no holds barred in your face punkrock with an attitude and anthemic songs. Luckily, the new album by the Boston veterans Street Dogs is just that. I listened and reviewed the record for this webzine.

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The album contains 11 songs of American punkrock and I loved every minute of this record.  I won´t go to the ex Dropkick Murphys stuff here because Street Dogs don´t deserve the comparisons, being the unique punk band for themselves and they don˙t need to live eternally in somebody˙s shadow. There are couple of highlights on this record. First, the title track is a call to arms, meaning that changes won˙t come via mouse click but you need to go out to the streets. “Angels calling” is a punkrock anthem that everyone can relate to, made for singing along in some pub and jumping to the beat. “These ain˙t the old days” made goosebumps on my skin and brought tears to my eyes waking me some emotions long gone. “Working class heroes” is in my opinion the best song on this record, an anthem for depraved, underpaid and stomped upon workers. There are couple of more rockish songs that did not work so well with me, but “Never above you, never below you” made me smile again. In all, this is the full blooded, pumping punkrock street punk album.

8/10

https://www.facebook.com/streetdogs/

 

Reviews, Various

(record review)OFF THE MARK-“Aging Disgracefully”(No Affiliation Records)

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Off The Mark released their first album after the five years hiatus on mighty No Affiliation Records, so I was happy to listen to and review the record for this webzine.

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This band comes from Arizona and plays the kind of melodic punkrock with pop punk and skatepunk influences like it was played in the 90-ies when I was a kid.  The album contains 10 songs of emotional, sometime humorous and autoironic but most of all awesome punkrock with heart and soul. When the first song “The Answer” started, I was instantly struck with the great vocals and melodies. I just couldn`t help myself and I know that it is not similar, not one bit but some songs like for example “When You Say” reminded me of later era Blitzkid vocally and in the song structure. I repeat, this is only my opinion and the music that Off The Mark plays has absolutely thematically no relation to Blitzkid. Most of the songs on this record are more pop punk oriented and mid tempo punkrock rythm graces most of the song structures. There are a lot of emotions behind the lyrics and somehow this record goes fine with me. When I was younger I just couldn˙t swallow such bands, but now, as I am older but certainly not wiser, somehow I evolved the taste for these type of punkrock bands. Good album! Top songs: “On My Own” and “Permanent Vacation”.

7/10

Links

Follow the band on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/offthemarkaz/

Follow the label on Fb: https://www.facebook.com/noaffiliationrecords/

Bandcamp: https://noaffiliationrecords.bandcamp.com/album/aging-disgracefully