Gob Patrol, like Cher, are only arsed with first names. They formed, when Jay the Guitarist met the singer Slam in Las Vegas over a discussion of punk rock bands. They soon found bass player Gogo and drummer Cody.
And rather like Cher, they’d like to turn back time (sorry about that, I sort of had to). They’d like it to be the late 1970s, and they’d like to be playing in a little club with spit covered stages and pogoing blokes with mohawks and girls with safety pins everywhere. At least that’s how you envisage 1978, if you’re me (and probably them?).
The point is that “New Spit” Is five songs, ten minutes of vicious, nasty music about vicious nasty things – and consequently, it is a lot of fun.
Right from the start of “Fucked Up Again”, its not the punk of The Clash, or even the Pistols. Nope, this is the more guttural, earthy sounds of bands like G.B.H and Black Flag, the sort that hardcore metal bands do when they fancy it.
There’s something so wonderfully primitive about the rock n roll of “What Am I Supposed To Do?” (sample line: “I gave you drugs and you turned blue, what am I supposed to do?”) and something gloriously, righteously angry about “Anarchy” that you can’t resist it. Slam’s vocals here are so ragged that they make Agnostic Front look cultured.
“She Wants Some More” is positively bleak and nihilistic. The product of glue and drugs, you imagine, but either way “Sin City” explores the brutality of life in their hometown of Vegas in such a way that I feel I missed out when I went and watched a couple of gigs and a lot of Seinfeld.
Throughout there’s a feeling that if they moved in next door then the house prices would probably go down, but there’s something about Gob Patrol that is just fabulous. They walk it like they talk it.
Rating 8/10
