Monday 19 May 2014

Brawlers

I Am A Worthless Piece of Shit

Alcopop! Records
Rating: 4/5
 
It's hard, when dealing with a band with as impeccable credentials as Brawlers, to ever full divorce them from whatever came before.

In the case of frontman Harry Johns that's especially true; following his stint as one half of the phenomenal Old Romantic Killer Band, his next project Wingman then penned one of the best grunge songs ever written ('N64', in case you're curious). Rather than plug away at the blues-inflected grunge forever, he then took a left turn and released an incredible, intimate folk mini album, 'Post Breakdown Blues' under his own name, before quietly releasing another rock track 'End of Days' as a video.

Brawlers, as I'm sure you've sussed out by now, is his new project - and they're rather a different beast, even if they bear some surface similarities to Wingman. The tempo is fast; the drums are big, dumb pop-punk, but the riffs and chords sound like classic Johns. His vocals are maybe a bit more polished and less raw than they've been in the past, but his sense of humour and caustic honesty are still intact; this EP is called 'I Am A Worthless Piece of Shit', after all.

If you're into punk rock in the Lawrence Arms/Asian Man Records vein (as I am), you'll probably like this. It's very polished compared to a lot of that stable, but the attitude behind it certainly isn't dissimilar. If that's too mainstream for you, then perhaps check out one of Johns' previous projects as they are more similar in tone to Jeff Rosenstock's poetic catharsis with Bomb The Music Industry!.