Hoisted

The first album from Brisbane quartet Sewers is dark, dirty and not at all nice. It’s the punk equivalent of surgery gone horribly wrong, writes PATRICK EMERY.

Ebbot Lundberg, the hirsute, caftan-wearing lead singer from The Soundtrack of Our Lives, once mused that bands have a tendency to transform into a form suggested by their title. Lundberg – who subsequently claimed ignorance of his potentially insightful observation – was talking about his previous band, the provocative and occasionally dangerous Union Carbide Productions.

Applying Lundberg’s analysis to Sewers is probably gratuitous, yet not necessarily erroneous. Sewers’ new album, Hoisted, is dark, dirty and not at all nice. It’s the antithesis of the facile pop that makes music industry executives salivate with excitement and ejaculate with greed.

Like Bird Blobs and King Snake Roost, Sewers plumb the festering musical depths of depravity with perverse glee. Opener ‘Grease My Chain’ cuts straight to the chase; in its more abrasive moments, it’s reminiscent of those depraved nights of my Adelaide youth watching The Plague at the Old Queen’s Arms, a violent squall of vocal bile and grinding guitar. The trick here – if it could be called a trick – is a wicked beat that drags you into the song’s orbit like some weird drug peddled by one of Barry Moyes’ shady mates.

‘Cabin Fever’ offers up a thumping beat like an initiation ceremony from the boys at the Fitzroy Motorcycle and Tattoo Football Club; if you get out alive, you’ll be stronger for the experience. ‘Fishing’ has a thin facade of pop sensibility – a rumbling drum beat trades blows with a spiralling guitar lick – while the vocals squeeze in for a snarling guest spot. ‘Pleasure Receptor’ confirms every suspicion the Christian right ever had about the Satanic destination of rock ’n’ roll, but isn’t it just piercing the thin veneer of civility that we all pretend holds society together?

It’s a formula – and confronting aesthetic – that appears again on ‘Sinkhole’. In geological terms, a sinkhole is a fascinating concept, a phenomenon in which surface layers give way, generally due to erosion of the underlying bedrock. Listen closely to this track, and you can feel the surface of rock ’n’ roll gradually collapsing as the Sewers punk-gunk grinds its way through.

‘Drive the Nail’ is less a song than a provocative philosophical statement, backed by a bruising and chaotic attack; close your eyes, and there’s a sea of heads throbbing in perfect unison. ‘Ugly Party’ is, um, just that. If beauty is in the beholder, then ugliness is everywhere you expect to be – and this track is the punk equivalent of 10-hour surgery gone horribly wrong. I mean that in a good way.

“This isn’t nice, in any sense of the word, but that’s why it’s so good.”

‘General Gore’ jumps in the car, switches on the ignition and tears off into the darkness, with ne’er a care for tomorrow. A rifle-esque backbeat gives way to a jarring melody, not dissimilar to Dead Kennedys’ skewed interpretation of ‘Viva Las Vegas’, and a thumping jungle rhythm that’d scare the living shit out of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ fictional hero. ‘Hoisted’ is the nocturnal drama that wakes you up in a cold sweat, with all your inner fears rushing through your fragile mind. This isn’t nice, in any sense of the word, but that’s why it’s so good.

Finally, there’s ‘Human Spray’, an amphetamine-laced rant that starts in a state of frustration and devolves into outright anger. It’s the antithesis of (and antidote to) the peace, love and understanding myth peddled by the insipid folk generation.

This isn’t a pretty album but, then again, the world isn’t either. But there’s also a strange, paradoxical beauty to be found in the depths of humanity. And that’s where Sewers are hanging out.

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‘Hoisted’ is out now through Homeless Records. Sewers play Tuesday, November 5 at Northcote Social Club as part of Maggot Fest with The Stickmen, Bits of Shit, Cuntz and Gentlemen.