Pinocchio wanted to be a real boy but despite a good heart he was led astray by the allure of shallow pleasures and, against the better judgement of his appointed conscience, Jiminy Cricket, was nearly turned into a donkey on ‘Pleasure Island’. Oddly, the allegory of Disney’s 1940’s animation is pretty relevant as there are plenty of shallow pleasures to distract us in the modern age, such as the dopamine sludge of social media and ‘entertainment’ TV. ‘Pleasure Island’ is now ‘Love Island’ and rather than turn into donkeys we’re being led by them. So, I see Those Fucking Snowflakes (TFS) as modern Jiminy Crickets, albeit ones that swears like dockers and give a fuck, not a little whistle.
This is the first release from TFS since 2020’s Straight Wealthy White Male Suffrage which featured such glorious titles as ‘Weak Men Fear Strong Women’, ‘Boris Johnson and the Big Red Bus of Bullshit’ and ‘Meat Is Murder but Morrissey’s A Dickhead’. This EP’s title echoes the shrieking voice we have all have in heads since March 2020: Everything Is Absolutely Fkkkkkkd and this EP crackles with more of their gloriously intense music and sandpaper poetry. TFS are not a band that spare blushes and their lyrics are as sugar-coated as gravel. As part of the press kit, I got a PDF of lyrics (something I really hope is also given away with the download). Here are just a few examples:
‘Uncooperative Crusties’:
“Come to your fucking senses. Come to your fucking senses.
Stop throwing shit in the sea,
Stop putting poison in the air,
Stop burning forests for livestock,
Stop fracking into the earth”.
‘White isn’t right’:
White isn’t right, Gammons marching flags in hand,
White isn’t right, Pink faces inflating with mis-placed rage,
White isn’t right, Master race? You’re all fucking morons,
White isn’t right, fuck off with your white lives matter.
Their music is like modern slice of Crass Records output spliced with a frenzied Cure and a crazed Psychedelic Furs. Their instruments burn with the fire of righteousness and their amplification courses with vitriol. TFS are a hurricane of indignation with storm force winds trying to blow the scales from our eyes. You could mute their music and still feel the implied volume of their words. This isn’t the gentle ‘sorry to bother you’ of the Woke, TFS are screaming you out of sleep because the house is on fire. But their true gift is the humour they fold into their rough, tough pastry and mixing their ire with titles like ‘By The Power of Barnard Castle’ and ‘CUADRILLA CAN FUCK RIGHT OFF’ makes me love them all the more. They are the Rembrandts of rant; fearless town criers holding up a mirror to the inequality and injustice in our society. Listen and learn with these glorious Blackpool Illuminators.
Everything Is Absolutely Fkkkkkkd is available now as a download and on 10” vinyl which is a yellow as incandescent as their rage.
Review by Paul F Cook