It sounds ridiculous but there comes a time when stupid collisions of genre, ideas that aren’t half as revolutionary as they’d like to appear and blind faith begin to drag. No band seems to want to play anything that might be able to be categorised in any way – it’s not ska – it’s dubcore, it’s not hardcore – it’s metalcore, it’s not punk rock – it’s Peruvian chanting. While, obviously, this is no bad thing for punk music as a whole, it’s worth noting that the success rate is so unbearably slim that for every Adequate7 or Sonic Boom Six there’s a dozen pale imitators not even worth mentioning.
A year or so ago I was bemoaning the lack of bands willing to try something different and strangely enough, here I am singing the praises of a band that fits firmly within the punk rock category because of their lack of pretensions and charming simplicity. Even isolated from the pack, there is no doubt that ‘Off The Beaten Path’ is a fine album, full of understated melodies and huge choruses. It’s an almost Celtic-influenced brand of street punk, like the Dropkicks but without the quirks. Opener ‘Sounds Like Shit’ is what The Swinging Utters sound like on their best days, all throaty vocals backed by hefty guitars that subtitle, yet never overcrowd the overall sound. The (clearly misleadingly monikered) New Breed are a band exhibiting an impressive amount of control over their music – each track is different enough to keep proceedings interesting but with enough of a common thread to provide a firm location.
‘Bombs For Oil’ and ‘Action’ are storming punk rock songs that move with the grace of a zeppelin, but nevertheless contain a heartening number of subtleties and a strong sense of personality. Little vocal tics or guitar lines elevate ‘Off The Beaten Path’ above the sum of its parts because they are so embedded within the music, rising above the surface now and then only to reassert the confidence and comfort of the album. And that’s another point – rather than being a collection of songs, this is a coherent album that functions as such. There are good and bad tracks, but everything is relative to each other and allows you to have 45 minutes totally immersed in rowdy choruses and punchy harmonies – fantastic.
Ben
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