Neo Neos Get the Neo Neos/Act VII LP

You very well might be familiar with the first half of this release, a classic slice of 2018 gonzo bedroom punk that came up around when you couldn’t turn a corner without bashing your beak on syncopated smart/smart-ass takes on what a lot of people unfairly paint into a corner as DEVO-worship. Now you can listen to it on vinyl! This is a decisively nasty, murky version of that sound, and it gets even toothier and more gnarly with the second half—a collection of new tunes post-2018 released for the first time. Tracks like “Sandbagging (My Way Through Life)” are blown-out with almost everything in the red. The vocal performances are unhinged and stab at the listener as they devolve into wordless refrains, yelps, and howls. But it still keeps the listener locked into its singular world of madness that continues on into the following cut, “Clockwork,” which almost hits like a no-fi MÖTÖRHEAD and then lands a churning groove all under a minute-thirty. If you’re a fan of this sort of thing, you’ll be in heaven. And you should be, because you’ve been very good.

• Reviewer Luke Henley
• Label Under the Gun
• Issue MRR #487 • December 2023