Piss Poor

Reviews

Piss Poor Under Attack cassette

New Haven, Connecticut hardcore punk, with six songs recorded live and released on the Big Neck Records subsidiary label Primitive Screwhead. This is what a hardcore punk band should sound like. The recording sounds dingy and fucked-up, without being punishingly lo-fi. You can hear the room and the imperfections, but nothing feels so buried or blown-out that you lose the songs themselves. The tracks are fast, short, and sloppy, and the guitar is ever so slightly out of tune. This panic-inducing PISS POOR cassette sounds like it could fall apart at any moment. All the little nuances where you can’t quite tell if you’re hearing an intentional choice or a mistake are exactly what makes this sound right. Those imperfections give this recording an impact that a cleaner, more polished recording certainly wouldn’t have. There isn’t anything particularly novel happening here, and I don’t think there needs to be. This is straightforward, nasty hardcore punk that feels like it could have come from almost any point in the last few decades.