The first thing to strike me about this demo is that the eight tracks clock in at a mere twelve minutes and thirty six seconds, with the longest track not even reaching two minutes forty and the shortest track only lasting thirty nine seconds. Some would say quality not quantity, but to whiz through eight songs in less than thirteen minutes would require some pretty fucking good quality to score well. My impressions, after several listens, are that THE KIMBERLY STEAKS haven’t quite nailed it, or even got remotely close.
In essence, TKS play a potent blast of spiky four chord trashy and very thrashy hardcore influenced punk. The hi-hat sounds like a pneumatic drill punishing my skull for being a naughty child in another life, the guitar sounds dirty and harsh but for all the wrong reasons. The main reason is the production is pretty shocking. Now I’ve nothing against a DIY recording, in fact it often adds a lot a character and can make an interesting change from uber-polished super productions. However, this demo sounds like it was recorded in a rotten old shed with the guitar plugged straight into a cheap Argos amp running through an even cheaper Argos multi-effects pedal.
I’m finding it hard to analyse the tracks in much depth as they are so short, they often all revolve around limited structures with shouty and often inaudible vocals threatening to rip my speaker cones in half, but again; for the wrong reasons. ‘Tribute to Tommy Sheridan’ is the stand-out track as it takes a slower pace to begin with whilst the vocals remind me Bob Dylan in places, which is odd to say the least.
I hate not to say anything particularly encouraging or helpful in a review, but I’m feeling quite lost with this one and hope the band don’t take it to heart, but this isn’t a good recording. As I have mentioned, the songs lack structure and aren’t heavy in the ideas department, the production is very weak and in general it’s damn scrappy sounding. It may appeal to some people, but not me I’m afraid.
www.kimberlysteaks.tk
Mike