The Dissociates - Waiting for the Backlash

When you do a music blog and provide an email address, there are consequences. If I added up all of the times I've won a million dollars from some random spam, I'd own this whole damned world, a few of the smaller planets and let's not even get started on the fact that my male appendage should smash rocks. Then being a music oriented blog, there are the publicists, who often don't even bother to read the blog and send you details about every rap and crap-pop album that their latest pretty young thing has recorded.

When Ned from the English band, the Dissociates contacted me, there was an immediate sense of dread mixed with curiosity. Luckily the emotion that kills cats won out, largely due to their description of being "post-hardcorey" because the Dissociates play tight post-punk with a sense of urgency. These guys could travel back in time and easily have a track placed on the "Urgh! A Music War" compilation. An unmistakable English sensibility traverses through "On The Motorway" and "Welcome to London". The latter could easily be commentary of the recent election debacle- "They say you're never two steps from a rat, round here we're a little closer than that.......Welcome to London where nothing ever happens, until it's too late".

There's a fear of urban decay in "Welcome to the Motorway" - "There was this girl who thought she'd never die, she ate organic every day, she lived with the birds, the flowers and sky but she's got nowhere left to play". The final song slows precedings down falling somewhere between Billy Bragg's solo material, Velvet Underground and 70's Bowie. It's the weakest track here but it has five great songs to contend with.

I have other music to review but I keep going back and listening to the potent songs on their site with the hunger of a drug fiend looking for a magical fix. The Dissociates ep can be streamed or downloaded for free here and if you have any interest in post-punk at all, this EP should be on your playlist.

4/5