Speck Speck cassette
Equation-core complexity meets feedback-riddled, no wave drone jazz on this eleven-song release. Imagine the bewildering instrumentation of BOTCH or DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN (without the tough guy affect) accompanied by CONTORTIONS-style sax riffing. That sounds like a mess, but it’s cool. The vocals are strained and desperate, buried just deep enough in the mix that, although unintelligible, they occasionally offer melody if you mine deep enough. “Dead Beach Boy” is head-bobbing, stop/start dirge-punk that propels forward into noisy chaos. “Blab Eye Chops” has a repetitive bass groove that creates a rhythmic backbone to atonal guitar and sax squall that sounds like NAKED CITY playing on a falling elevator. Eclectic and innovative, punk at its core, SPECK experiments with the form to our benefit.