Woodboot's Doing The Crime Time

Seriously, can Woodboot get any more diseased? Since the Brisbane band started out some years ago as a passing concern, the core duo of Dan and Julien cranking out scuzzed out garage punk, they have grown like an Akira homunculus, sucking in Sam McKenzie (Sulphur Lights/Occults) on second axe bludgeoner duties and Donnie Miller (No Anchor/Roku Music/Forevr) eschewing guitars and smashing the kit like the reprobate Troglodyte that he is. Crime Time is the fetid result. Each song is all about brevity with a mainline blast of fuck-you punk, tearing viscera through their serrated sawing and heckling howls. Songs like ‘Trash Dump’ is the kind of punk we hear a lot of around Brisbane parts, from the 70s punch of The Leftovers to the cartoonish chaos of Undead Apes and everything in between, but then you get to the killer slack-jawed, legs-splayed power punk of ‘Prison Planet’, all jagged edges and dripping Neanderthal fangs, that the transmogrified remnants of the likes of Hank Wood, Circle Jerks and the Spits are ripping through the entrails of the four-piece, a chest-burster showing the diseased intent within. ‘Gut You’ is fucking feral, all blood-vessel searing feedback and three-chord torture, throats being shredded almost out of psychopathic glee. ‘I’m Gonna Push You In Front Of The Bus’ is, despite of its name, a more “pop-oriented” punk blast, a Ramones template lynched and dragged along the bitumen behind a busted-up V8, some semblance of attractive melody showing beneath the blood and gashes. I can even hear ‘Return Of The Rat’ in Crime Time’s insistence that there should be rhythm underneath the sledgehammer-and-kerosene debris, if somewhat used and abused.

I’m proud to know Woodboot – I'll do time for them for sure.

Hug Thee Drugs & Alcohol

I may as well talk about the Brisbane scene in relation to actual Brisbane bands, that'd make sense wouldn't it?

Thee Hugs are three stupid fucking idiots that occasionally step up and play something that resembles music, but isn't quite. That sounds like a terribly mean and rude way to speak, but seriously, it's why I like Thee Hugs. There is zero pressure, zero expectation other than you will drink a lot and laugh your arse off to these guys. It might come as a shock, but the trio have put out an album on Long Gone Records. Unsurprisingly, it's called Drug Use & Alcohol Abuse, and it's some of the trashiest, brazen, pissing into a fan style of garage rock you are likely to have invade your orifices. They sing about someone pooing in the pool - you know this is scraping the bottom of the tetanus-infested barrel with nail-less fingers. But, like licking rusty spoons, it's a perverse pleasure. As if you don't want these guys violating every fruit in your fridge, freebasing your salt sachets and flinging feces at your sleeping children. Hell, they'll have you doing it too soon enough. Come lose your mind with us...

Buy Drug Use & Alcohol Abuse here - it's only $15 for the 12"! See - they're crazy! That artwork from Occults' Sam McKenzie is goddamn killer too - the complete depraved package.

Migrating To The Woodland And Into Your Drunken Heart

Murky fuzz band and local whale enthusiasts Tiny Migrants are releasing their debut EP on CD (7” available through Mere Noise later this year) at Woodland tomorrow night! Ive been a big fan of every facet of this shambolic collective ever since I saw them support Mark Sultan in February - they were literally the first "new" band I saw when arriving back in Brisbane, and they still delight with every show, especially their interesting set when in support of the brilliant Ty Segall.


Now this show will be incrediballs, not just due to this (and they love to drink, so you know it will get fuzzy and friendly), but the supports have stepped up in the form of motivated party-bunch Cannon, reverb spiked Sunshine State and the return of punk trio the Sulphur Lights. That is huge, shitfaced-worthy news, and seeing as its all for $8 you cannot go wrong. CAN NOT. So get there. And to sate you, here is the first song I heard them play that really grabbed me...

Tiny Migrants - Honeycomber