Album Review

Axis Of – Finding St. Kilda

• 15th Mar 2013

For a punk enthusiast, it’s rare to find an authentic Irish band that can actually deliver the goods, especially with the Boston-dominated US punk bands like The Street Dogs and Dropkick Murphys reigning supreme.

The Celtic twang, playful melodies and The Bugsy Malone nod-of-the-head of “So you wanna be a boxer?” on Cardiel gets things off on the right foot immediately and it’s apparent that Axis Of are a serious force to be reckoned with. Carefully arranged, powerful, stabbing guitars with seriously dirty distortion are reminiscent of Pinkerton-era Weezer with a skew-whiff twist, while the group vocal harmonies prove that this band have the melodies and songwriting talent to back up their swagger.

The slightly more poppy bounce of We Dine On Seeds gives way to some tasty guitar work a la homeland contemporaries And So I Watch You From Afar and Adebisi Shank, but there’s something a lot more accessible and immediately likable about Axis Of. Where the former often both fail to fully connect as they weave complex and sometimes self indulgent instrumentals, these plucky upstarts plug straight into the pleasure cortex and fire several thousand volts of chunky riffs straight into your synapses.

Axis Of are keen to show a bit of diversity with heavier offerings like The World’s Oldest Computer serving up a portion of Feed The Rhino flavoured hardcore – in fact, much of the middle section of the album retains this ballsier and more headstrong feel – a pleasantly brutal intersection that enables the bite of this band to match their bloodcurdling bark. Brobdingnagian is a personal highlight, with a sledgehammer riff that Clutch would be happy to have in their extensive arsenal of audio armaments.

This is a brave, eclectic and refreshing release and it’s almost sad that in this day and age we have to praise a band for doing something different and striking their own course, but you have to take off your hat to the creativity and individuality on display on what is a triumphant debut release just begging for a beer soaked circle pit full of die hard fans. This album probably won’t set the world on fire, but Jesus Christ it deserves to.

Venue: Finding St. Kilda
Support Band: Smalltown America