Labels: Dire
Review by: Andy Malcolm
I am big appreciator of the Sceptres day-glo, post punk loopiness. They’re all agreeable melody and bouncy rhythms, whilst Bryony gleefully cackles over the top. I have practically zero points of reference for this outside of X-Ray Specs, as I dedicated my obsessive music collecting years to listening to shitty DIY emo instead of shitty DIY post punk. The latter is a far more acceptable thing to be seen to have done I suspect, but I have no shame. None at all. Anyway, “Flatline Generation” is a real ‘banger’ as I believe the adolescents would say. It hops back and forth from foot to foot like some kind of manic hopscotch game that has gotten totally out of hand, before lapsing into a killer chorus. This is just over 2 minutes of flipping good fun. “The Tow” isn’t quite so gloriously enjoyable, but delivers hefty bass guitar straight up the arse and more of those ace vocals to appreciate. Clocking in at just under 2 minutes, that’s the perfect duration for this kind of tuneful lunacy.
Bastards snipped the corner off my review copy! Grrr. But that doesn’t stop me giving it the little blue rectangle of utter approval…