Demos

The Inevitable Backlash - My Two Brookes

Owain Paciuszko 08/01/2009

Rating: 3/5

Opening with a sleazy guitar/drum-line and accompanied by lead-singer John Renton's Frank Black-like drawl, the title track of this debut LP by the Los Angeles-based band gets off to a appealingly scuzzy Sonic Youthy start. There's a distinctive LA underground-indie-punk vibe to the record, apparent on Diego Rivera which has the flavour of when Brian Jonestown Massacre go off the rails.

Things go awry vocally on Abby's Face with Renton's vocal tics and gurning in stark, distracting contrast to the garage-pop sound. Fortunately his style reapplies to Philenbus a scattershot, cacophony of noise, breakdowns, catchy riffs that seems destined to cause many a mosh-pit based injury in basement clubs. That L.A. sunshine creeps through again on the laidback, open-top groove of Silence Comes that practically screams a hazy, post-alcohol stroll down a sunny promenade with its lazy guitar licks and obscure, freeform lyrics.

It's an album that grabs your attention one second and then throws it out the window the next. The Inevitable Backlash are interesting and can put together a really great tune, but over the course of these ten tracks and thirty minutes they are at best catchy, witty and weird and at worst a tad irritating.