
Crimson Boy – Crimson Boy
Genre: Post-Punk
Crimson Boy is a band that produces a thread of mystery. It’s not easy to nurture a serious myth around a band. The absence of one can drastically affect a group’s chances of their legacy travelling beyond the shackles of the times in which they are producing their music.
The artists whose reputation has never waned have all successfully experimented with myth-making. They are the ones whose peak days are trapped in ember. Frank Sinatra is always the supposed mobster. Led Zeppelin may have fed a girl to a shark. And, Throbbing Gristle was part of a bizarre conspiracy to bring down the monarchy. If any of those are untrue, please don’t let me know.
Crimson Boy’s self-titled single shines in hiding more than it reveals. The tense post-punk texture and the gloomy video feel like the kind of pet project of a strange 1980s cult, now revealed for public consumption. Crimson Boy is a worthy, artsy descendent of the goth, and new-wave bands of an era where choosing one’s favourite band were as important as opting to favour one political movement over another.
Ex Ømerta – Haunted
Genre: Hard Rock, Garage Rock, Alternative Rock
Ex Ømerta is a band on the lookout for the next big thing. Once they find it, they dispose of it in a river somewhere, and the group will hope to be the only ones left.
It’s strange that we live in times of such widespread trouble. It’s bizarre that the music, and other forms of entertainment, that are being proliferated, share so little of the sense of despair. Call it consumer escapism, or blame it on record companies knowing what does and doesn’t do good business.
Adversity has a habit, though, of motivating the individuals that want to succeed the most. And, angry, tense rock music has a habit of finding fans, especially in moments such as these. There’s never been a bad time for an opportunity after all.
Ex Ømerta’s Haunted is a dark, but palatable modern rock sound. The folks behind this have surely pricked up their ears to the sounds that have made stars of the likes of Arctic Monkeys, or Queens of the Stone Age. Ex Ømerta makes a modern brand of stadium rock, one created for large, but darkened areas, songs created for those that are looking for a way out.