In keeping with the musical style, I’ll keep this short and sweet. A recent conversation with my housemate left me with a demo tape of his band, Ugly Parts, a local New Brunswick punk outfit. I was eager to pop this one into a tape deck. Yeah, they went old school putting out actual cassette tapes, a great touch. I found a working tape deck, which turned out to be a little more difficult than anticipated, and popped in the tape.
I was instantly greeted by a familiar sound; crashing cymbals and primal screams. My mind took me back to those early college semesters when punk was all that emanated from my headphones. I liked this. What followed were five songs full of rapid-fire guitars and lyrics. Think the Circle Jerks. And much in the vein of the aforementioned Jerks, almost as soon as it had begun it was over. Five songs in under five minutes. Classic punk form and classic punk sound. It was refreshing, and almost washed the bad taste of modern “pop” punk from my mouth. Here I was, thinking punk was dead, when it turns out it was alive and well, right in my own house.
If you can find a tape (and tape deck), and five minutes of time, you’ll be thoroughly pleased. If you’re not one for dead recording formats, go to their site, where you can listen to the entire tape as well as find out when they’ll be playing a show near you (chances are if you’re reading this, they’re all near you).
http://uglyparts.bandcamp.com/
Louis Coutoufos