New Releases

It’s always the way. You spend ages waiting for an album to be released that’s worth writing about and then suddenly two come along at once.

The first of these comes from Oregon-based punks, Poison Idea.

Poison Idea have been around since the early 80s and have spent vast periods of their career “on hiatus”. This is their first album in nine years, and only their seventh full-length release in nearly thirty five years.

The line-up has changed more times than a chameleon on a tartan rug, but vocalist Jerry A is still angrily growling away at the front of the stage.

Confuse and Conquer is an almost perfect album for fans of old school hardcore. Opener, Bog, grabs you by the throat and won't let go and the onslaught continues for roughly half an hour.

The only blot on Poison Idea’s copybook is Dead Cowboy. It sounds like what would happen if The Shadows, Dick Dale and some Mexicans were all put into a blender.

All in all it’s a really good record. If you put it on repeat you might manage to listen to it 157,680 times before they bother to release anything else.

The second album comes from Godfathers of Hardcore, Agnostic Front.

There are no surprises with this record. Agnostic Front have found a formula that works and pretty much stuck with it.

That’s not to run it down at all.

This is half an hour well spent. There are sixteen tracks, ranging from short, sharp, thirty second bursts to anthemic songs of more traditional length.

After thirty five years they’re still angry and just because the songs are pretty much all about New York doesn’t mean they don’t apply to the rest of modern society.

This might be the best-produced album the band have ever, err, produced. The sound quality is top notch and they’ve resisted the urge some bands have to make it guitar-heavy.

Give them both a listen.