
Bad Sauna – Kun nään koiran (mun sydän sulaa)
Genre: Punk, Alternative Rock
Similar artists: Pixies, Dinosaur Jr., Fontaines DC, IDLES
Bad Sauna make a blissful distortion drenched racket on the single Kun nään koiran.
People who oppose their true nature, generally, end up creating some of the most fascinating art. Like finding out that you’re related to a great dictator, like having been employed by Bernie Madoff, or having ghost-written a book for Madonna, musicians from Finland must escape their must to find their way to greatness.
The specter of power metal sopranos and drummers who possess a single beat to their repertoire hangs over them like an abattoir rising above the chicken coup. Bands from Finland rarely sound loose and carefree because, well, they’re from Finland.
Bad Sauna, a band we’ve covered before, is a rare and brilliant exception. Kun nään koiran finds them trading gleeful Pixies-like guitar-blows. It’s a powerful, unstable sound that feels almost like running down a hill. It’s life-affirming, fun, and treats the guitar with the exact level of respect it deserves. Just enough. And, it contains no songs about wizards, rainbows, or angry sopranos singing songs about the woods. It’s good.
Chiliocosm – Diamond Cutter
Genre: Punk
Similar artists: Rise Against, Pennywise, Dance Gavin Dance, Rufio, Billy Talent, Sum 41
Chiliocosm bring punk, metal, and hi-fi production values together on the single Diamond Cutter.
There’s no use to expect your modern punk rock to sound as if it had been recorded by sneaking a cassette player under the wooden stage. Those production values have been left in the past, albeit, for some of punk’s classic records.
Modern recording techniques make music sound like a perfect reconstruction of reality, like an expensive video game looking to recreate the colours of the world. Plus, let’s not fool ourselves, ideally, for many of the rock bands involved, video games will be one of the mediums in which their music is going to be heard. Reality is often consumed through a screen so it needs to look and sound appealing.
The sounds then need to slice quickly and confidently. Chiliocosm manages this with confidence on the single Diamond Cutter. Here’s a band that makes angry music and highly proficient playing sound downright fun. It’s shiny, it’s new and it’s rocking.