Labels: Adagio830 – Protagonist
Review by: Sean Haughton
acid fast’s demo a couple of years ago showed some promise and a
couple of really high-quality rippers fighting their way out of a
tinny lo-fi recording. here on their first full-length, they take huge
strides in both songwriting and recording and whaddayaknow, this band
is actually fucking great! while most of the time throwing out
superchunk references feels lazy and off the mark, acid fast really
nail that sound without it being a wholesale rip (the opening riff of
‘triangle park’ is more exciting musically than anything on that last
superchunk record). the guy who sings has some real worn down eric
bachmann-style vocals. i think it’s fair to assume you could probably
have a conversation with members of this band about the finer points
of the merge records discography and earlier seam releases. the two
best songs from the demo get full breathing room here and ‘old ideas’
remains a song i wish i could have written. it’s one of those songs
where you have to play it about 5 times over before you can move on
with the record. worth mentioning that if you were ever into the band
big kids there’s some personnel crossover.