Last year, Richmond, Va.'s Cement Shoes bestowed their debut 7inch on the punk rock world. For many, it was quite a rager. It was probably a headscratcher to many too. Incorrigible hardcore circa say 1983 walks into a circa the same year high school autoshop class where some greasy long hairs are debating the magic of Bondo and how rippin' some Foghat song sounds blasting over the Kraco speakers they just mounted in the trunk of their '76 Cutlass.
Being a high school student of that particular time and space, the story would have, no matter how much I would root for them, would have not ended well for the punk rockers. Hell, the legends would probably still be lingering about greasy, dirty first flying and the sound of 100 pair of tan Dingo boots stomping and kicking to this day.
On this, the band's debut LP, like that single, such did not happen though. Instead, they joined together to form a maniacal force of early frenzied hardcore, guttural black metal growls and wrathful boogie.
The count off of the record's opener, "Unite The Right In Hell", may give the listener a sense of Ramones-ish familiarity. That stops right as the "4" is shouted as a barrage of descending guitar chords drill through the skull and then down through earth to it's molten burning core, leaving the subject matter at hand where they belong for eternity rather propping up and hiding behind a bullshit image of Jesus that many a person have molded into a reflection of their true rotten selves here on earth.
While a similar thread (and sentiment) runs through songs such as how "Satanic Soul Picnic" inexorably tempo jackhammers but give space to a bong rippin' guitar solo and the absolute dervish that's "How It Is", no human can't survive on smashing and crashing alone. The diet here also consists of meat grinder funk stabs with "Mine Mine Mine" and, in the case of "Falling Man", resembling biker rock constantly battling a severe case of night terrors.
Swim with the fishes at Feel It Records
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