Aside from a stray Badger there is no real active threat from any naturally occurring wildlife in the UK, excluding of course if you are foolish enough to eat some of the more poisonous fauna. Even the greatest, most highly evolved predator in the world: The shark, seems to take up a stoic placidity on our shores, having possibly mistakenly attacked that one drunken man back in 1845, even though some of them look pretty mean and more than capable of qualifying you for the Paralympics. I would therefore chance to say it as a Briton that you are more likely to fall harm to another kind of shark than the aquatic kind, I refer to Bristol’s latest grind output Acid Shark whose energetic and full throttle rodeo of grind is poised to bring about grazed limbs, bloody noses and any other hazard a mosh pit entails.
In all fairness their release titled Bombs Away is a 3 track demo, and therefore deriving conclusions which may be fruitful and stand the test of time may be akin to counting your chickens before they hatch. That being said Acid Shark do put a lot of meat into their tracks, a 1 minute 37 seconds entre, 2 minutes 2 seconds mains and a chunky 3 minutes 14 seconds dessert. The songs themselves are swelling with the wealthy influence of British Crust Punk; anchoring the loud, dirty and pissed off vibe of Amebix et al as the lifeblood of the release, however not before bringing forth the more sharp, hasty and overall full on traits of grind into the recipe.
Guitars have a nice rolling edge to them that makes for some catchy riff jumps, and fundamentally remain the main crust pusher in the works, drums remain dutiful and although not presenting anything droll, offer nothing exceptionally commendable either. Vocals have the distinct British crust punk sound to them: that 20 something, angry but not fuming and vocal chords likely strained through cold wet nights, excessive smoking and boozing we all know, a nice choice of tone, but can sort of blur with the rest of the music given its monotone nature, and thus would benefit from a bit of variety on choice moments.
Overall presentation and song architecture is strongly reminiscent of the mid-eighties crust/thrash influence. There is an overall high pitchness to it, and when considering the overall feel and mechanics of the music, would be somewhat strongly similar to World Downfall Terrorizer, if Bombs Away had been relayed through the same unforgettable distinct sound output they adopted.
Overall a very strong release, worthy of both the crust punk heritage it pays homage to and the grinding banner it bears. Pluralisation to the vocal range would be an added plus, as would a more confident drum regime, that being said though both in their current states are quite enjoyable. I am not expecting these lads to be the next Wormrot or Sakatat, but they certainly flexed a comfortable show of potential to be an active and respected part of the UK grind scene, a potential I look forward to seeing pan out.
