Wow, Okay, Cool – Fuck, That’s Bleak
Genre: Punk, Post-Punk, Noise Rock
Similar artists: Mclusky, Death From Above 1979, Gang of Four, The Bronx, Sleaford Mods
The world has always been a strange, confusing place and the three-minute singles with all of their pretty, nicely designed melodies have never seemed anchored in reality. This is part of the reason why so many looked upon the original punk bands as veritable saviors of music.
The newspaper stories of the time said it all. These bands made aggressive music. They couldn’t really play. And the lyrics to their songs dealt with the kind of topics that would surely get banned on state-sponsored radio. Great! If this wasn’t a reflection of the times, then what was. It hardly even mattered that, for the most part, the bands in question were just pub-rockers looking for attention.
Wow, Okay, Cool’s Fuck, That’s Bleak try to put the record straight by being uncompromisingly unlikeable. The American group is the equivalent of the friend determined to spoil your day by quoting all of the figures that suggest that the world is speeding towards its own extinction. Get a beat behind that and a guitar that sounds like it is being played by a frustrated chimney-sweeper, and you have the majestically dirty sound of Wow, Okay, Cool.
Modern Moxie – Til I’m a Ghost
Genre: Indie Rock, Garage Rock, Alternative Rock
There’s no real point telling somebody that they should feel thankful for their lives when they are actually miserable. The world just doesn’t work that way. People do not compare and contrast their lives with others as a means to figure out if they are satisfied or not.
And, after all, some of the greatest protest music of all time has come out of places that were, by and large, much better off than the majority of the other locations in the world. The Sex Pistols recorded the ultimate punk record as a protest against life in Great Britain. Bob Dylan was infuriated with the U.S.A masters of war. And even the Krautrock bands were a commentary on life in stuffy Germany. Sure, none of those countries are located in Eastern Europe or Africa.
But, it doesn’t mean that they are perfect either or that the people that are able to critique it properly should be caught napping. Modern Moxie’s Til I’m a Ghost is an alt-rock revenge fantasy about the modern U.S.A. These musicians and others like them, this is a land that has become corrupt and uncaring. Still, if you think that this is a song with which you’ll be able to relate only, provided that you are politically aligned with their message, rest assured. At the heart of it, this is a dynamic rocking tune filled with big choruses and jamming power chords.
