Now this record quietly crept up on me and bit my bollocks off. If I were to judge a book by its cover, the unappetising CD-R with black scrawls on the front did not initially endear me to Stupid Brick. Add to the fact their name is crap and I have to be honest and state I didn’t really expect too much. But these Welsh lads really know how to pen a tune – and boy, are some of the tunes here pretty darn good. Imagine the bastard offspring of classic Pennywise, NOFX and Strung Out and throw in some Welsh Valley realism for good measure and you won’t be far off. First impressions may have been cack, but Stupid Brick are anything but.
Unfortunately I don’t have a tracklisting so I can’t name songs, but after a particularly amusing South Park ripped intro a cacophony of skate punk guitar riffs and machine-gun drumming just rips out of nowhere. The vocals are quite American, but with this kind of music anything else would sound daft. The vocal melodies are spot on and the song structures are broken down well enough to keep things varied and interesting. Technical guitar riffs thunder from the amps too. In places the band remind me of Phinius Gage at their best, although there are major hints at old-skool NOFX. There’s even a slower song that has up-strum parts, although you can tell the band’s tongue is in its cheek.
These Bridgend boys started life in 1997, so after almost 8 years I expect any band would be tighter than Britney pre-wedding night (allegedly), but these guys really impress. The odd song disappoints – track two is really bland – but on the whole this is impressive stuff. They remind me of Mistake Us For Friends quite a bit and it’s well known us PT chaps like a bit of MUFF (ahem). Turns out we could be partial to a bit of Brick too…
www.stupidbrick.com
Paul