When I was sent this record to review I was told that the band didn’t really know what they sound like. I can sympathise; it’s pretty difficult to describe your own music. I figure this is because when you’re playing them, you think of songs as being built out of riffs and licks and beats and vocal lines and those sequences of notes or rhythms that you really like, whereas when you’re listening to music you’re more inclined, conscious or not, to try and understand it in terms of what you’ve heard before. I dunno – that might be bullshit, but it sounds about right.
Anyway, Grazes! These guys hail from Sheffield, and this here is their first official release, a 7″ co-release between Holy Roar, Ebb and Flow and Crash Landing Records. It’s also available digitally, yadda yadda. In terms of sound I’d place it alongside the nascent powerviolence scene of the 90s, itself emerging from the hardcore punk scene of the late 80s and early 90s, along with some early thrash-esque solos. There’s a solid old-school feel to it, in other words, both in terms of songwriting and sound.
Don’t misinterpret that, though; this isn’t some shoddily-recorded EP from the 90s. The sound is beefy and solid as befits a modern release: the drums, bass and guitars all pop out with suitable intensity, keeping songs from devolving into a mush as the pace picks up. ‘Down in the River Styx’ is perhaps the most reminiscent of the aggro UK hardcore scene, even at times reminding me of how old crust/anarcho bands sound (in my head, at least; memory often disappoints with old records). As with all of the songs present, though, it’s not a love-in for a particular genre that’s had its day: the band draw influences from an impressively distinct range of sources, which is pretty impressive given the stripped-down nature of these songs.
‘Never Get Back’ devolves into a lot of wailing and shouting when it hits the midpoint breakdown, and it’s here the band’s northern accents are most clearly distinct (“you fuckin’ twat!”); given the song’s short length it’s a surprise that it later fades away. Still, it leads into ‘My Last Day’ well enough; here Grazes throw in a PM-heavy intro with a sludgey vibe to it, before kicking into the hyperspeed bruising hardcore that’s the defining characteristic of powerviolence. By contrast ‘Rex Anglorum’ restrains the pace a little, managing as a result to be the hookiest song on the record, although it’s still under two minutes long.
A lot of the songs on the album use similar tricks; drumbeats recur on numerous songs, a lot of the slower-paced moments are punctuated with lead guitar and sustained tremolo, and of course there’s only so much variation you can put into chords played at an obscene tempo. But regardless, this is a solid record that rarely stands still, and the seven songs present are varied enough to hold the attention, shifting from slamming aggression to sinister ponderousness with laudable confidence. It’ll be interesting to see where Grazes go next.