The Usual Pleasures - Swollen/The Walking Dead

Hear The Track Here

Although I have reviewed Sheffield, UK band The Usual Pleasures a few times, one of those doesn't count. See, if ya remember I reviewed their Kevlar Heart a couple of times; once as their introductory track and again with a remix/remaster which did - in all fairness - definitely make the track better. Mind you, you'd have to like your music pretty raw because punk lives on and nowhere moreso than The Usual Pleasures. Strangely enough, yer actual punk rock sound is undergoing a resurgence here in the UK so maybe they've caught the zeitgiest (hee hee see that, just like a real journalist!) (Ed: he means using a word without having a clue what it means)

Now I have had more arguments with so-called 'singers' than just about any other brand of musician, why that is I don't know. I do know its the fashion generally in music not to give a crap about (say) pitch and timing, and yay verily even more so when we take the whole punk ethos into consideration. However, even the punk greats actually HAD to sing in tune, even though there are many people these days who scorn such things. The reason I mention it is because Swollen is affected by this but, surprisingly The Walking Dead isn't. Musically, the music isn't out and out punk, although Walking Dead gets real close to it, but a rocky kind of alternative. No bad thing as it happens but I do prefer The Walking Dead for its more punky approach.

Now I know that the vocalist here can sing in tune so I can leap to two precarious conclusions; this is intentional and I should therefore shut my big fat mouth before it gets slapped or it wasn't intentional and maybe they aren't aware of it. The third option (there is always one of them) is that they just plain don't give a **** so long as it sounds good to them. Nonetheless, it's easily fixable and nothing to lose sleep over. If I had to point you guys at a representative track that shows who The Usual Pleasures are, it would have to be The Walking Dead.

Punky Zombie anyone? (hint: not a cocktail)