Shrinkwrap Killers Feed the Clones Pt. 2 LP
This is a refinement to the highest degree of this project’s original mission. Carrying on the baton of the SPITS’ catchy post-apocalyptic brain damage rock, or at least hinting at it, this project carves its own identity as self-assured and grim pop songs (to a degree) buried in aeons of cosmic sludge. There’s a theatricality to the proceedings in the best way possible, especially in more dirgelike fare like “Eminent Death,” but there is nothing cornball here. The music is excellent, the melodies and harmonies laser-focused, and the scope has a space opera sheen even while keeping me mired in the muck of the gutter. If you’ll indulge me, this feels like punk’s answer to SLOUGH FEG’s cosmic RPG concept record Traveler, but while that band is mighty if terminally uncool, this project manages to construct something no less epic but much more rad. The stabs of spooky Ed Wood synth queasily piercing the tight mutoid punk never grows old, and overall this is a wealth of ideas all in one majorly satisfying package.