Deathcats, over the last year, have been hitting the releases hard and gigging every weekend that a shift pattern would allow.
Kicking off with ‘Liquid Gold’, the chorus bass provides the chugging basis for a far harder sound that a listener has sadly come to expect from a the washed up reverb sounding bands.
Thankfully the band seems to have adopted the reverb and Thee Oh See’s delay noises as merely flavours and not built their tracks on such used foundation.
Recorded at Glasgow’s Bakesale Recording Studio, with ex-PAWS man Matt Scott, the process of capturing the band has been well matched to the direction Deathcats are aiming.
Lead single ‘You’ is catchy in the same way that their previous single “Dream$” was.
We can forgive the frontman James McGarragle for this skilful rewrite of the latter, as that song is as strong as anyone could hope to write.
Set tempo for MOR for next track ‘Sprint’; a waterfall of chorus guitars and cymbals again distancing the group from previous garage rock outing, the picking guitar section reminiscent of Real Estate and all those bands that almost made the Stone Roses style guitar bearable in the late 2000s.
‘End Game’ goes all sludgy, widely known to be Black Sabbath fans it comes as a nice send off to see the band hinting where their heads are at currently.
Shame they’ve called it a day isn’t it?
Shame doesn’t cover the New Swears side of the split; the overdriven vocals, paper drums, hints of harmonica and group vocals periodically cover up the recording of the group scratching their guitars with one hand and their balls with the other.
Words: Gayham Crisps
Rave Child 