Record Reviews:

Dirtblonde – The Hangmen

Dirtblonde are Lula Blue and Ivan Hell (oh yes). They look ace, like snotty d.i.y. rock urchins; one with blonde hair, one with black, sporting home-customised, slogan splattered garb. And they excel at choking out a sneery, fuzzed to the max noise.

Sounding like it was recorded down the phone from some out-of-hours, sticky-floored basement hellhole, ‘The Hangmen’ is a delicious slab of nasty rock scuzz. Ivan’s guitar revs viciously as Lula, sounding coldly bored by proceedings, sings. The drum-machine (excellently named Dee Dee) snaps out a dispassionate beat, adding to the overall sense of pissed off teenage torpor. Three quarters of the way through I’m thrilled by a sickening, squawling guitar ‘solo’.

‘Superfan’ marches to the sound of an emaciated glitterbeat and features a lovely clanging guitar noise like what Uncle William (Reid, obv.) used to make. ‘I’m So Tired’ sounds like one of those shambolic late eighties fuzzpop bands like The Flatmates or the Rosehips, only wrung of all joi de vivre. It lurches round the room with a bottle in its fist as Lula burbles, ‘I’m so tired, I’m so tired’ before slumping in a corner and conking out.

Dirtblonde’s shtick is not new and it’s definitely not clever, but it’s the sound of motorcycle crashes, of bruised eyes, of existential rage and a yearning for glamour in a grey world. It sends me running to my ancient, battered copy of ‘Psychocandy’. And that’s always a good thing.

RRRP: Glassy muffling furrow

www.dirtblonde.co.uk

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