Labels: Portswood Punx
Review by: Alex Deller
In these strange times where people are analysing trends and scenes past to the minutest detail (“we sound like Malmö, circa November ’83 through to March ’84” or “we’re channelling that Black Flag live set from the May of ’85 where Ginn’s gear malfunctioned and he had to use Saccharine trust’s backline”) it’s almost refreshing to hear a band be just what they are. You can most likely guess where Soton punx Chemical Threat are coming from based on their artwork alone (and, if you’ve not yet twigged, the first track is called IMF (International Murder Fund)…), but there are no Japanese influences, no blown-out mysteries, no Hellhammer riffs and no harking back to some laser-guided micro scene that no-one under the age of 40 even knew existed until it was randomly uploaded on some blog the day before yesterday. True, it’s ultra-simplistic and been done a billion times before, but it’s pretty ok, y’know? The sound is crisp and wiry, the songs hover around ‘catchy’ territory and the singer has a gobby Nick Blinko sneer that I can certainly get along with. I wouldn’t necessarily go out of my way to snap up everything they’ve ever released or travel 100 miles to see them live, but if you like simplicity, Discharge (duh) and the early Mortarhate n’ Crass Records stuff then you’ll probably enjoy Chemical Threat well enough.