GHOSTFORM, AIDS Wolf, Wine Lips, and Hut Hut
GHOSTFORM - Songs To Cry To
The recipe for this band has some dynamite ingredients. Members of Surf Dads and Blue Youth start an emo/hardcore band with Merv xx Gotti fronting it. The album title screams emo and the lyrics do the same. Gotti goes all the way emo, both lyrically and vocally and the result is a massive success. The music was written by guitarist Gage McGuire and based on this album and everything else he has ever done, he might be incapable of writing a bad song. This record is catchy and sweet, simple and fun. There are moments where I wonder if it is an emo record, like the opening track, “SLEEVES”, with its massive, stadium rock guitar riffing. Who cares about genre though. This is a really good EP. Five top tier songs written by sad boys or happy boys playing sad.
AIDS Wolf - Harsh Human Style
Four new tracks from noise-rock legends AIDS Wolf! The first track, “Sixty EIGHT” starts like boopa boopa then goes BANG BANG BANGBANG BANG with brawr brawr tay tay tay tay over top. The first half of the song is like a robot moaning in a wood shop, leading to the second half, a fuzzy punk bit with non-words that sound bleated through a ball-gag. The next, “Sixty NINE” opens with squelching guitars with twisted, moaned crooning before settling into fucked up riffing. Imagine having a nightmare about a Hendrix solo. Track 3 is annoyingly titled “Sixty SIX” and it is the AIDS Wolf version of a surf song. The guitar twangs and twirls into a horrible soup with the vocals cack and glack, creating a perfect soundtrack for a day at the worst beach in the world. Track 4, “Sixty SEVEN” has big, bluesy hell-riffs that weave and dance with the vocals while the drums move from being foundational on the first three tracks to being the star of this one. The soar over the rest of the song, rattling and cracking authoritatively. AIDS Wolf aren’t for everyone, but they are for me. I loved every second of this EP.
Wine Lips - “Semi-Detached Furnished Home”
The idea of releasing a two song 7 inch with one of the songs being an original garage punk banger, with a Roger Miller cover on the b-side is just about the coolest thing in the entire world. Side A, “Semi-Detached Furnished Home”, is a fuzzy, bratty, smart little track that will be stuck in your head for at least a day. Then they turn Miller’s “Lou’s Got The Flu” into a perfect little garage rock track. Cool cool cool. This is all very cool. This was my first sip from the Wine Lips chalice and I like it very much. It’s out on limited edish vinyl!
Hut Hut - “Hut Hut”
The neat little phoenix rising from the ashes of Winnipeg indie pop band Boats. Hut Hut is a seamless evolution with the familiar perfect-pop songwriting and the wild vocals of singer Mat Klachefsky. These songs are different though. They are still cute and fun. Stuff that makes you want to dance around the room, but there is a maturity and a moodiness that exists now, if only in the margins, between the lines. The arrangements are artful and dense, which plays with the lightness of the tempo and vocals. Flachefsky seems to put every bit of heart and energy in his body into each track, but it still has a restraint and a thoughtfulness. It’s all pretty wonderful.
