Consolation Repulsive Reflections EP
Third release by this geographically-spread UK hardcore band, although the second was a super limited lathe 7” with two songs which are both among the six on Repulsive Reflections. The first side of this EP mixes up crust-adjacent hammer blows (“Abstain”) and creepy crawl trudging that explodes into wild VOID-like guitar mania (“Theft II”), and to that end makes for a pretty clear bridge back to CONSOLATION’s debut tape from 2019. On B-side numbers “Free” and “Stolen,” I pick up screamo vibes—at least one member of the band has a background in the 2010s UK iteration of that scene—in the guitars and vocals, like an Ebullition Records version of, say, PERSPEX FLESH. Works a charm for me. Speaking of charm, I really like the variety of people named in the lyric sheet’s “inspired by” list, including Kano (the grime MC), Shon Faye, and Bernadette Devlin.