I may have occasionally dismissed Region Rock in these pages and I have surely disparaged the subgenre in person, so imagine my distress when I hear something that clicks just right and I realize that...."fuck, I think this is that subgenre I casually knock without really knowing what the fuck I'm talking about." We all get judgy from time to time so I'm not going to beat myself up over it, and I'm not even sure that that is what this is anyway so there's that too. But when I hear something that clicks just right, I keep listening. The music sounds strained, the musicians themselves sound strained - as if even these relatively simple melodic punk songs are just out of reach. The vocals nail that JAWBREAKER by way of DOOM after three packs of Lucky Strikes vibe, and if it weren't for the clean guitar some of these tracks ("My Debts To You" particularly) could have been born in a Rust Belt basement in the 1990s. Maybe the appeal of Region Rock is the darkness-by-way-of-hope energy that permeates the sound in a way that transcends the music or the lyrics. Or maybe that's just EVICTION PARTY....or maybe I don't really know what I'm talking about. That's always a possibility worth considering. I'm gonna have more coffee now.
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