Chainsaw Hookers: We Want Your Blood
I like it when an album feels like it’s pummeling your brains in, and this one does that from every angle. Chainsaw Hookers are from Australia. That’s obvious right away, since they sound like AC/DC on angel dust barrelling down the highway on motorcycles made of skeletons.
Every song on this album is titled after some videonasty gorefest – New York Ripper, Make Them Die Slowly, Hills Have Eyes, etc – and the lyrics match the themes, all eye-gouging and suburban Satan worship and geysers of blood ‘n’ offal.
Musically, it’s also pretty trashy, full of pseudo-metallic riffage that feels rusty and jagged, and big hooky choruses that sink into your ear-holes like a Ginsu knife. We Want Your Blood is a party with no survivors. Essentially this is what would happen if you locked a bunch of teenage hoodlums in a video store for a month in 1988. I mean, with guitars. Otherwise they’d just sit there and watch movies. (7⁄10)/o:p
Dirty Rotten Souls: I Bet She’s Filthy
This brief EP is a tantalising glimpse into what could potentially be an arena-wrecking band. These Brit flash-rockers absolutely nail it on the title track, a sleazy, wicked little jammer that essentially sounds like what Velvet Revolver might’ve if they tried harder. The rest is live and/or acoustic, but still good. Get in on the ground floor. (7⁄10)
Crossplane: Masturboned
I dig these guys, with song titles like Bumsucker they sound like they’ll do anything on a dare. I bet at least one of them is in the hospital all the time, recovering from sick livers or some sort of Evel Knievel shit. Anyway, imagine Motörhead are young and German and fearless and you’ve got Masturboned. Completely relentless. (6⁄10)
Bikini Hunters: Bikini Hunters
These are Brazilian rockers singing in their mother-tongue, which means I have no idea what songs like Prazer e Mais Nada or Voando Alto are about. So I guess they’re about whatever I want. Maybe science? Brother, these sleazy scientists really kick up a mean fuss of hard-charging, punk-fried dive-bomber rock‘n’roll. (6⁄10)
Southern Fried Genocide: Electric Mayhem
Florida weirdos who self-describe as “prog-metal” which is, I mean, what? That’s definitely not what’s happening. They sound like Clutch trapped in a cage full of snakes. Just panic and fists and serpent venom flying everywhere. It’s fucking great. Is truncheon rock a thing? If so, that’s what this is. I’m into it. (7⁄10)/o:p
