Kudre – Johnny No Mates Army (Police State)
Pop songs and disaster movies are great predictors of the near future. AI must be handling this by now, but I assume back in the Secret Services, back in the old days, there must have been someone assigned to count how many of these songs and movies got released in a particular year. The services could easily then gouge the mood of the public and, if needed, prepare for an insurrection.
When talking about modern songs, the word “anthemic” gets thrown around like American face-painted arm wrestlers doing their little playacting for television. Most so-called “anthemic” songs are just invitations to work longer hours and drink more on the weekends. The songs that are truly worth being chanted by thousands of people are about the things we don’t want to admit in public, the things we’re worried about and the things that don’t make it on the evening news.
Kudre’s “Johnny No Mates Army (Police State)” is a genuinely anthemic punk song that captures the collective fear of the Western world that free speech has disappeared and there will never again be an opportunity to influence the way that the world is run. But if that’s too heavy, don’t worry. Kudre produces a booming song. It’s restless, rebellious and doomed to fail just like all earnest protests these days. But it’s also memorable, powerful, and catchy, just like the very best punk songs.
Sallies – Uglys
Most poets throughout history have been content with writing rhymes about love in exchange for a sandwich and a night’s stay in a cheap motel on the outskirts of Paris. The ones who stuck with this grift long enough were traumatised. They could no longer write another love poem or stare upon a thing of beauty with admiration.
Instead, from Baudelaire to Arghezi, they focused on the aesthetics of the ugliness, of the grotesque. Grime and putrefaction have also concerned rock bands. Apart from the punks and black metal kids in Norway who never desired to create a fan base, grunge and alternative rockers were the only ones who embraced these ideals and who made looking and feeling terrible seem cool.
Charmingly low-key and endlessly melodic alt-rock band Sallies have constructed their own anthem for the cheap, unwashed grunge revival. It’s called “Uglys” , and it would make Cobain weep. It’s so well crafted that it’s nearly a pop song. It’s so obsessed with ugliness and failure that it’s nearly a Baudelarian poem. But as long as you can tap your foot to it and go and buy the band’s merchandise at shows, it’ll have to stay a great alt-rock song.
