Thoroughly disgruntled punk racket from this Memphis crew, who initially sound a bit like a skinny, more wiry (and indeed Wire-y) take on circa ‘82 Black Flag (think if they lost most of their muscles and replaced all the distortion with small amp treble), but subsequently strike out in a more imaginative direction, attaining a sort of expansive, graveyard crawlin’ feel reminiscent of The Flesh Eaters, tempered with shots of obtuse venom and strangulated telecaster terror that come on like distant echoes of The Dicks’ ‘Kill From The Heart’ LP.

And speaking of distant echoes, there’s a bit of a contemporary, post-Oh Sees type element going on here too, with excessive reverb and barely controlled echo applied to just about everything, working well with some malignantly convoluted riffs and buried female back vocals to give things a pleasantly unearthly horror movie psyche feel at times.

I guess I don’t have much more to say about it right now, beyond dutifully noting that it turns out this is actually a late 2012 release that I didn’t hear until recently, so let’s just conclude by stating that, whilst it’s not really an immediate head-banging blast or anything, a few listens really cement this as one of the best punk records I’ve heard this year. Check it out.

Buy from Goner here.

Labels: best of 2013, Ex-Cult