Reviews

Hate Street

The Plane Crash Nostalgia for the Gutter CD

This record kicks off with a classic blues riff and I held my breath as I waited for more hallmark Americana sounds. But instead, they pivoted into power pop, and for that, I thank the pilots of the PLANE CRASH! The rest of it kinda plods along with a garage-y lo-fi sound reminiscent of the VIBRATORS, though also carrying the rock’n’roll through with CHUCK BERRY-like solos. But hang on a second, the song “Nothing on My Mind” is a screwball, out of left field (to extend the baseball metaphor, ‘tis the season)—DEAD MILKMEN and the GROOVIE GHOULIES come to mind at the same time. Then we go right back into JOHNNY THUNDERS raucousness, only to be met with a DEAD KENNEDYS homage with the song “Killing Fields.” Overall, the record lacks a homogeny. Now before you come for me, I mean the songs are all under the same umbrella, but that umbrella has holes in it and isn’t consistent in keeping things dry. I think all the songs are absolute bangers, out of sequence as I may think they are. I have a feeling that this is a newer band, and if they’re still finding their groove, I’d say they’ve got a super solid footing already.

The Plane Crash Too Little Too Late EP

The aspiration here is to make nostalgic, gritty rock’n’roll, but there’s something charmingly off-kilter about the presentation that makes it more than just a pale shade of something we’ve all heard before. Mark Death’s vocals have that sort of monotone sociopathy to them, while the guitar has a direct-in compression that gives everything a sort of detachedness that manages to elevate the tightly-written material from “JOHNNY THUNDERS knock-off” to something much more odd and a hell of a lot of fun. There’s a meager few tracks here to sink your teeth into, but the hand-hewn quality (see also: the horrorcore high school notebook cover art) makes it worth your time.