3 out of 5

Label: Expert Work Records

Produced by: Aaron Leitko (recorded by)

Solid punk rock produced by on-to-bigger things duo Sean Mcguinness (Pissed Jeans) and Chris Richards (Q and Not U), given vinyl life by Expert Work Records in 2023 – after a journey across formats and recording sessions stemming back to 2008. It’s quality Ramones-adjacent simple stuff, amped up by the intensity of youthly snarky lyrics and a balanced sound that keeps the pop of the Ramones comparison but razor-edges it with a rawer, meatier sound, leaning more into Pissed Jeans territory than Q’s emo math style. If that’s your thing, that’s your thing, but I otherwise can’t draw much from this. Even without knowing the eventual path of the musicians, this sounds like what it was – a capture of a temporary jam between some creative types – and so beyond crafting admittedly head-bobbing tunes, the stuff doesn’t cut too deep. The lyrics aren’t tossed off by any means, but they’ll play with rhymes you can call out a few lines ahead, and after about the midway point, some of the more interesting stuff in the music writing gets streamlined into straightforward punk. It’s… okay. It’s very well made okay-ness, though, that sounds a lot more polished than these pre-relative fame kids had any right to be making.