PLAY DEAD – Thameslink
Similar artists: Amyl and The Sniffers, The Chats, HotWax, SNAYX, Lambrini Girls
Genre: Skate Punk, Punk, Alternative Rock
There’s no secret that English-speaking countries have virtually monopolized rock music all through its rise and even into its lean years. There’s no reason that the big music money is to be made in the U.S. And, frankly, nobody can deny that your best in locating a powerful, inspired rock band has been to peak on what the British are doing.
They’re the best, alright. But they also have every reason to want to play angry music. It’s not just the endless, pelting rain, the fact that for all their obsession with football, they never win anything or the state of the economy. It’s the fact that making music is, essentially, a grand form of escapism. Besides, nobody sounds funnier than English people when they’re angry.
PLAY DEAD take a shot at the London Dream with “Thameslink” a punk tune that sounds like the cries of a student considering whether to become a football hooligan or move to the country and make cheese. It’s angry, alright, and funny, too. It will make you feel like you’re sitting in the rain, waiting for the ol’ double-decker, trying to avoid the smell of stale cider coming from the pockets of those sitting next to you. Still, it sure beats the U.S. songs about driving down the highways, looking for a smoke. Don’t expect the Brits to get happy anytime soon. They’ve little reason to do so. But expect them to stay the best.
pMad – Opinion
Genre: Post-Punk
The world’s a pretty predictable place on most days, and most of it is occupied by ordinary people doing ordinary things. It’s the same across the world unless you happen to live in, say, Iceland, where volcanoes shoot out from the ground in your back garden, or Yemen, where warring forces exchange bullets on a daily basis.
And the world needs to stay this boring in order for it to thrive. This kind of order and discipline certainly has to have its positives. But it leaves a lot of people, especially those dealing with the weight of an artistic temperament, with plenty to demand of it. This is, perhaps, one of the reasons why gothic rock and all of its dark, mysterious aspects continue to have such a strong pull for a certain minority of listeners.
Just like any self-respecting cult, goth-rock needs new blood. pMad’s “Opinion” does a good job of approximating the original late 1970s sound of goth and predicting its future as well. It’s a soundtrack to walking around large, cold, empty halls during the middle of the night and finding pleasure in uncertainty and bad judgemental calls. It’s not any different from what the French symbolist poets might have considered to be a good time.
