Labels: Agitprop!
Review by: Kunal Nandi
There seems to have been a considerable increase in the number of duos in hardcore recently. I remember when it was just godheadSilo, but now you’ve got Pink And Brown, Orthrelm, Touchdown. They seems to be some sort of a pattern to all this: a) they’re all on Troubleman Records, and b) they are all totally fucking nuts. Fagatron and Ninja Death Squad are both in category b), but without being in a), so I’ll have to continue the research. Perhaps forming duos makes more economic sense, as you are only splitting any money you receive two ways. Grindcore one-man-bands are surely just around the corner.
Anyway, Fagatron are a fucking hilarious bass-and-drum duo, making really messy hardcore with an infectious sense of humour that turns what could have been a really arch in-joke into bite-size chunks of good clean fun. There aren’t any lyrics printed, but I think the first song is some kind of anthem (sample lyric – “Fagatron! Fagatron! Faga-Faga-Fagatron!!!”). Priceless.
Ninja Death Squad are a far more structured guitar-and-drums outfit, but are no less fun because of it. Their sound is really raw and aggressive hardcore punk, which surely could have benefited from having a bass-player (at the very least) added to the ranks, and made everything sound heavier and more crushing. Just my opinion.
All on sick hot pink vinyl! Is this the best record ever??!? No, but it’s damn good fun.