Aural Aggravation

New Heavy Sounds – 16th February 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

As a label, New Heavy Sounds really do what they say on the proverbial tin – giving a platform to heavy music, while seeking out new forms and styles. Yes, they’ve brought us a slew of stoner doom, but also vintage heard rock with contemporary spins – and, as Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard and Black Moth, representing each respectively, also illustrate, representing female-fronted acts, too. And so, next up, London-based queercore punk trio, Shooting Daggers.

Having debuted with an EP in 2022, they shared a split single release with intense and fearsome Ukrainian punk labelmates Death Pill last year – and it was a most fitting pairing.

Said single contribution, ‘Not My Rival’ features on this, their debut album, in remastered form, but still clocking in at under two and a half blistering minutes. This version isn’t really different, just cleaned up a bit and mastered at the same volume as the rest of the album. And what a fiery blast of rabid punk fury it is. ‘Give Violence a chance!’ they holler while the bass tears the flesh from your ribs and the guitar burns.

As a title, Love & Rage perfectly encapsulates the pounding ferocity of the album’s nine explosive cuts, the majority of which are comfortably under three minutes in duration. Sal’s vocal delivery is of that circa ‘79 / ’80 vintage, but at the same time contemporary, shouty, spiky, a dash of X-Mal but equally ragged and raw and without stylistic affectation. This is music played with passion, music made because it has to be, an act of catharsis, pure, unbridled venting.

The mid-album slowie, ‘A Guilty Conscience Needs an Accuser’, which closes side one on the vinyl version, not only provides some welcome respite from the incendiary fury, but also showcases their capacity for melody, harmony, and subtlety. There’s certainly not much of that to be found on the rest of the album. ‘Tunnel Vision’ is a gutsy grunger played at double speed, and ‘Bad Seeds’ pounds in a manic hardcore blast which tears your head off and is out the door in a minute and twenty-three.

The title track lands unexpectedly anthemic, energetic but considered, and even a bit Dinosaur Jr. It works, and it works well, and the final track, ‘Caves/Outro’ plays out on a ripple of piano and a note of tranquillity, a calm after the storm. And for all of the ferocity which defines both the album and the band themselves, there’s much positivity in the lyrics and an energy to the performance which is anything but negative.

‘Yeah! Do it! Do it!’ Sal encourages enthusiastically on ‘Dare’; ‘Just have a try’ she sings on ‘Smug’, and on the title track, the message is to ‘Turn the pain into power’. But this is no feeble stab at rabble-rousing or a cliché and ultimately empty bit of tokenistic fist-waving. Shooting Daggers appreciate that anger truly is an energy, and they bring it with full force. The result is an album that packs a punch, and when it comes to punk credentials, this is the real deal.

AA