3 out of 5

Label: DIscos Mascarpone, Mongolic Records, Flexidiscos, Willy A Muerte Ediciones

Produced by: Pablo Peiró

There was a point where I listened to mostly punk, but, in the grander scheme, it was pretty truly a point – I didn’t have the ears for hearing much difference between a lot of punk bands, with a handful of singers and styles falling into (to me) very general piles of similar sounds. Maybe that’s the truth, maybe not; I suppose I feel like music – super broadly – comes down to the impact of the tunes, and a direct way to “hear” that is through the distinctness singer (if there is one) and the distinctness of the songwriting. That is: have memorable sounding pipes and a catchy or notable sound, and you might earn some followers.

This is, as mentioned, broad so that it can be stretched as needed, defining “distinctness” and “impact” in various ways. Going back to punk, then, I think it’s even harder to stick out since the palette is often limited to shout-singing and three chords; sometimes maybe it’s just that you heard band A first and so that’s the one that sticks.

…Which is maybe a long-winded way of saying I feel like I’ve heard bits and pieces of Carmonas before. There are moments on this disc where the group’s clean-guitar riffing and gang-vocals energy injects some off-brand indie spirit into a track (the opener is super good for this), where we break from the repeated chorus and chord progression to go a little squirrely for a second, but things go back to normal pretty quickly. However, that riffing and energy do help: Carmonas is quick and fun, with a good balance of snark between childish and adult mantras that makes it flexible listening for whichever age you’re feeling your rebellious or staid streaks. But inevitably, in my somewhat dismissive take on punk, the songs start to blend together, if not sounding like songs you’ve heard elsewhere. Hearing Carmonas’ version first, though, would be a good way to set the bar at a quality standard.