TST Gimme Gimme the Shock Treatment 2xLP
Double LP compilation of TST’s early records between ’81-’83, excluding All Through The Night and its stadium hair metal vibe. A lot of songs, but what is more challenging is to wander away from listening to them. Somehow the whole collection carries this natural flow to it, while the songs vary between STOOGES-wanting-to-play-hardcore and the whole palate of KBD melodies, heaviness, nastiness and pace demonstrated in a first class style. I prefer the songs that are held back by some sort of a Sunday afternoon hungover melancholy, when you are slow enough to realize the cold war is still on, you are an outsider, and it just passes but never ends. When they go hardcore they avoid becoming ridiculous, although this is not the spiked mangel you might expect from a Swedish band. Beside being TST’s early discography, this collection presents how punk had transformed within a short timespan, and how that time was packed with influences that easily penetrated a band’s sound. Even in the swirl of changes, TST could keep an individual sound—yet my advice for listening to this collection would be to take breaks, and search for your favorite era and sound because in its whole it starts to feel like a kid flaunting that they did all their homework.