Sharp, snappy, and serious, Cheltenham-based post-hardcore up-and-comers I, The Lion really nail things down on Run. Fat riffs, some cheeky Whammy pedal squeals, gritty guitar tones, gut-busting drums, wicked tapping sections – all of the above and more can be found just in first track Hold Strong! Fans of Biffy Clyro, Reuben, Arcane Roots and Read more…
Over 22 years since its release – and more than half a decade since Killing in the Name famously wiped the floor with X Factor pop puppet Joe McElderry – Rage Against The Machine’s ten-track debut remains as fierce and stirring as ever. This album is one of my very first musical loves – and it continues to be a regular soundtrack to my daily goings-on even in the face of the innumerable songs I’ve given time to while running TMMP.
At the start of 2015, Read more…
A message for punk-loving guys suffering from the January (and/or pre-Valentine’s-Day) blues: If Bowling For Soup’s upcoming greatest hits package doesn’t entirely cure your affliction, this album will. Read more…
Punchy and poignant punk-pop songs painted in primary colours on a pitch-black background. That’s a lot of alliteration – but it’s also an accurate way of summarising Bowling For Soup’s considerable back catalogue.
Bowling For Soup are punk-pop legends for a reason. On the surface, their songs are easily accessible and stand right on the brink of being disposable. But none of the tracks in this collection fall over the edge, thanks to a rare emotional depth and a wealth of genuinely awesome hooks that, well, get you hooked immediately and will never let you go. Read more…
Modern pop-punk bands can be divided into two categories: those who settle for penning copy-and-pasted pastiches, and those who pump their heart and soul into their music and make even this now-getting-quite-old-and-tired genre feel fresh and exciting again. No prizes for guessing which side Boston Manor fall on; if they were shit, I’d have just moved on and you wouldn’t even be reading this! Read more…
Dropped right before Christmas last year, Rose Coloured’s Doorstep Volume 2 compilation doubtless made great stocking filler for a number of Surrey and Hampshire’s resident music fans. It also offers plenty of great reasons to get excited about the Guildford- and Aldershot-centred music scenes in 2015. Read more…
I have a very strong emotional attachment to many of the releases listed below. Choosing this list was exceptionally tough; I’ve been fortunate to discover some incredible bands and artists over the past year, and it’s safe to say that outside this list lie a great many immense tunes that can be found via a quick browse through TMMP’s archives when you’re done with this lot. However, the following choices are the cream of the crop. Read more…
2014 has been a good year for awesome album launches at the Boileroom. This time around, opening act Rival Empires lived up to expectations by delivering a strong set backed up with energetic stage presence and buckets of passion. Current TMMP favourite If I Was A Whale (prefaced by a short grammatical debate as kicked off here) sounds epic live, overshadowing the inevitable Paramore comparisons with nostalgic reminders of how good Lostprophets were before Ian Watkins started touching kids. It’s all about the clean sections in that tune, while elsewhere we got unexpectedly brutal riffs and shades of the Foo Fighters and Incubus. Add to that some solid musicianship and a guitarist capable of throwing up the devil horns mid-riff without missing a subdivision, and you have a brilliant up and coming British band. Read more…
For many of us, our comfort zones lie outside the physical world. Face-to-face conversations are bring replaced by IMs, text messages, tweets, and comments on Facebook statuses that drop off your news feed after you’ve scanned over them once. From this social evolution, a profound sense of disconnect is gradually emerging.
Vivien Goldman’s Punky Reggae Party Show explores the meeting of two groups for whom deep connection and active communities were paramount: Reggae musicians and punk bands. As a talk named after a Bob Marley single penned in appreciation of the Clash’s cover of reggae artist Junior Murvin’s tune Police and Thieves and hosted by a respected NYU professor, writer, and music journalist, Goldman’s Punky Reggae Party Show might sound to some like a stuffy, overintellectualised snoozefest entirely out of sync with the attitudes and ethos behind the actual musical movements being discussed – but the reality is very different. Goldman speaks from first-hand experience of the front lines of reggae and punk at the time of their very first meeting, and her enthusiasm for music with deep meaning and intent is both boundless and infectious – making the Punky Reggae Party Show an exciting and engaging experience. Read more…
A friend recently asked me to write a review describing an awful band as a “shit sandwich” – and when Sweet Deals On Surgery offered up this EP in exchange for a brief review regardless of which words I might choose, I expected to wind up satisfying both parties. Unfortunately, the former will have to wait a while longer – because as scrappy and unkempt as Total Reek Hole is, it’s just as equally enjoyable. Read more…