grunge

Make Friends With Hell – BLACK SURF – EP Review

6th May 2024 — Leave a comment

Black Surf’s “Make Friends With Hell” is a fun, surf rock tinged EP. Taking influence from the likes of Weezer, this four track EP takes gorgeous melodies and drenches them in distortion to amazing results.

The EP explodes into life with “Lights Out” with its Weezeresic intro and power pop leanings. The riffs on the track rival the Burj Khalifa for size, towering over the track and leaving no decibel behind. This wall of sound approach is consistent throughout the EP, with the band wearing their 90’s rock influences as a badge of pride.

The vocals add a touch of emo angst to the opener, matching the emotive nature of the guitars which lay below them.

“Lights Out” gives away to “Vultures” with its heavily distorted intro. The track keeps the high energy up with its driving drum track, with them especially taking a beating on the chorus, creating a beautiful cacophony of noise.

“Oh, Poor Me” begins with a huge wall of guitars, very much reminiscent of bands such as Joyce Manor.

The track appears to take influence from various groups, with the quiet loud nature of the verses and choruses reminiscent of groups such as Nirvana and Pixies, and vocals on the chorus channelling Billy Corgan with their grungey quality.

The light sprinkling of Moog-esic synthesisers on the track adds to that 90s rock vibe and adds a nice contrast to the guitars in a similar fashion to early Rentals songs. As time passes, the track sinks further and further into its sludgey sound to excellent effect, submerging the listener in its crunch.

Closing with “Baby Blue Washburn”, Black Surf takes 60s surf rock and sends it over a wave of distortion. The sweet melodies and bass-led verses smash into massive crunching choruses, which are joyful to the ears and bring the EP to a satisfying conclusion.

Overall, I really enjoyed this EP. The group’s talent for songwriting shines through these four tracks, which are both sweet and sour at the same time. If you’re a fan of groups like Weezer and Joyce Manor, you’ll love this EP. You can hear it here.

Newcastle based band Stasis announce a single is in the works

13th Nov 2019 — 1 Comment

Local band Stasis have announced that they are currently recording their debut single, ‘Lies’.

Introducing the band

The band revealed that the track is close to completion with just the bass missing from the song.

Stasis supported The Sheds last Monday at Think Tank? in Newcastle, in what proved to be an amazing moment for the band.

‘It was mint’ said drummer Dylan with the rest of the band quick to back him up.

The communal atmosphere of the band is apparent when you meet them and this vibe has translated into the songwriting process for the band as revealed by the band’s singer Tamzin.

‘The melodies are written by Fae and Ben and I write the lyrics,’

‘When Fae writes a song it’s very different to when Ben writes one, they come from different ends of the spectrum,’

‘Fae will write more heavier, grungier songs whereas Ben will write more alternative or indie songs.’

However, the band had originally been recording within Newcastle College, but the group were underwhelmed with the sessions.

Instead they have been camped around guitarist Ben’s ‘little’ mic writing and recording songs using Garage Band which the group seemingly prefer.

The band draw from numerous different influences with each member of the group coming from a different musical backgrounds.

These different approaches have shaped the sound of the band with influences listed from grunge to indie.

Guitarist Fae has cited influences from grunge icons Nirvana and the Smashing Pumpkins as well as taking inspiration from the shoegaze music of My Bloody Valentine.

This contrasts with bassist Patrick who instead takes inspiration more from Mac Demarco and indie music in general, this creates an interesting mix of songs which keeps the band fresh.

The band wants to be a unique entity which is very much them and no one else.

‘We don’t have a persona or anything like that, we want to be ourselves’ said the band’s singer Tamzin. ‘We all dress differently and we’re a mix of people.’

The Band playing their first ever gig – @thebandstasis

The band met in college with drummer Dylan having the idea to form the band. Ever since then they have been working and creating music.

What the future holds for Stasis they don’t know, but what they do know is that they want to enjoy it as much as they can.

The aim for the future is to simply get as many gigs as possible regardless of the venue with the band just happy to be playing music.

This means recording more songs, which the band have been doing with an EP coming in the future as well as the upcoming single.

This will hopefully lead to more amazing moments for the band live

Make sure to follow Stasis on Instagram here to make sure you don’t miss any future announcements.