I love a Bandcamp Friday, in spite of the deluge of emails it brings, as it’s a great chance to support grassroots music especially. But shining like a beacon yesterday was a new EP release from Black Mekon. Everything from their masked aesthetic – like goth Lone Rangers – to their own take on lowdown-dirty-blues quickens my pulse and Underwhelmed is no exception.
The title track is a tightly-fuzzed glam-beat, drag race that sounds like someone has filtered Marc Bolan through a gravel pit. Black Mekon can pack so much in to a 2-minute track: stop-starts, gritty guitars, propulsive drums, wailing backing vocals, and the cherry on this noir ice cream sundae is some crazy harmonica. The band said in their mailout:
“UNDERWHELMED is the anti-anthem for RIGHT NOW!
Apply the song to the villains and disappointments in YOUR life… World leaders? Local government? Ex lover? Your parents? US??
It will work however you decide to use it, and maybe it will help exorcise those demons without you doing prison time!”
But put your hands in your digital wallet and you get three more tracks: the jackhammer distortion of ‘Your Gum, My Hair’, ‘Sticky Beak’ with its heritage blues slide guitar, thudding beat and tinny radio vocals and the EP’s finale ‘Bite Me!’, a chromed-up hot-rod with flame decals screeching away from the drive-in diner at 3am.
They say this EP is “the fuzziest chewiest bubblegumiest Black Mekon release ever!” I would not disagree. From record to their riotous live shows, I am Black Mekon ‘til I die.
Black Mekon socials: Facebook | Instagram | Bandcamp
Review by Paul F Cook
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