Freedom Faction - We Present You With These EP Preview

Hailing from Cambridge in the south of England Freedom Faction are one of new thirty-somethings bands made up of people who've served their punk apprenticeship and decided that what they do is relevant to the current music scene. Up for review are three tracks from their forthcoming ep "We Present You With These".   All three songs  ‘Come Up And Get It’, ‘Viva La Punk’ and ‘Blah Blah Blah’ bring to mind an edgier early Penetration, no doubt due to the fact of Rhianna Milton's vocal delivery, but also on the music side of things the band produce an highly credible take on 77 inspired punk going for melody over speed. As mentioned the vocals are strong and aggressive at the same time showing vocal abilities and the Pauline Murray/Penetration sound is more than comparable on "Viva Le Punk" a great anthemic song that is sure to make people stand up and take notice. The band up the tempo on "Come Up And Get It" whilst still retaining a melody driven by the rasping guitar a theme continued with the final song of the preview ‘Blah, blah, Blah’.

Definitely a preview that makes you anticipate the full release, Freedom Faction are a band that are worth keeping an eye out for.
www. myspace. com/freedomfactionuk

The Traditionals - Generation of Today - Impact Records

From Pittsburgh, Pensylvania The Traditionals have been plying their blend of early eighties punk and Oi influenced music for just over 10 years, with three previous albums under their belt and heavy gigging in the USA and Europe, the latter part of 2008 sees the release of the new album 'Generation Of Today' on German label Impact. What the band serve up is 15 tracks of fast paced aggressive streetpunk stepping a steel toe cap doc marten into hardcore, imagine Bonecrusher crossed with GBH with a bit of Rose Tattoo thrown in for good measure moulded into their own style. Vocals provide a nice balance between in your face gutterpunk and quite harmonic rantings (similar in parts to Oddie, Resistance 77 ). Lyrically the band throw in good measures of thought provoking social commentary (‘Propaganda Games’, ‘Generation Of Today’) and down to earth lads banter (‘Lets All Get A Beer', ‘End Up In The Pub’). Clever use of lead and rhythm guitars drive the majority of tracks from the start and provide insights into quite accomplished musicianship backed up by solid bass and drums.  You get the feeling the band know exactly what they are doing in the song writing stakes with short burst catchy solos exactly when needed. Each track screams out for your attention even as the album nears the end with ‘Win Some Lose Some’ seeing the band drop the tempo and delivering a great rousting rocky Oi song. Production wise the album bursts out with energy and I can imagine a ‘live’ show by The Traditionals would not be that far away from this.

Overall the album successfully crosses over the Oi/streetpunk and hardcore genres, not an easy thing to do, definite challengers in my ears to Bonecrusher's rightful title of kings of american streetpunk.

www.myspace.com/thetraditionals

Hear tracks from the reviewed album on the humdrumpunk FNA025 Podcast on the above site!!

The Blameshifters - Disenfranchised Anarchist - Self Release

Coming out of Stockton, California The Blameshifters rightly fly the DIY flag and this three piece happily promote themselves as good old fashioned melodic speed punk. An initial independently recorded and released album entitled ‘Feast Before Famine’ was inflicted on the North California scene in 2005 and again ‘Disenfranchised Anarchist’ is another true independent release.

After hearing a couple of taster tracks from the album, I had high hopes of an American band who did not go down the so predictable American pop punk route, and I wasn’t disappointed.

The album kicks off at a great high speed tempo with ‘Fish in a Barrel’ and gives a hint of the tongue in cheek sarcasm of the lyrics that flow through the album. Although all tracks on first listening give you a familiar feeling (NOFX, Bad Religion and even musically The Dickies flashed through my mind at some point) without sounding like anybody in particular, out of nowhere comes a riff that makes the track easily distinguishable from the next and a closer listen to the lyrics on future plays brings a wry smile with the bands take on American life.   It’s a difficult choice but ‘Not Religious’ is the highlight of the first half of the album with its catchy riffs, harmonies and anti-priest lyrics all packed in under two minutes two seconds. An irritating highlight as I had the tune and chorus in my head for the best part of a day! No mean feat if you know me and my short term memory.  

Riffs, melodies and harmonies are prevalent throughout the album and it’s obvious a lot of thought has gone into crafting each of the songs, without over doing it. A lot of albums suffer midway through, not this one. Some of the strongest tracks keep the attention span in check particularly ‘Our Flag Rules’ followed by the title track ‘Disenfranchised Anarchist’ and my personal favourite, ‘Those Guys’. With the very occasional drop in tempo this album comes to an all too sudden close with the final two tracks ‘We’re not that Dumb’ and ‘Stupid Drunk Kid’, both follow a similar format to earlier tracks, but again new elements are thrown in to drag your attention back

Overall a well crafted album with high quality production for a DIY release and a worthy addition to anybody’s CD collection. If two minute catchy melodic speed punk is your thing, then it’s a definite buy.

Check out the band: www.myspace.com/theblameshifters  www.theblameshifters.com

Disenfranchised Anarchist by The Blameshifters will be the featured album on the Humdrumpunk Podcast FNA024 on November 29th 2008, tune in at www.myspace.com/boredom77.