Eat Your Young - Bitter Sweet Kicks (Beast Records)
Melbourne’s Bitter Sweet Kicks believe in the ethos of hitting hard and fast and then moving on. Each of their three releases to date has been a seven-track affair, long on dirty, high energy rock and roll and short on indulgences.
“Eat Your Young” is a blast from go to whoa, pulling no punches but not always taking the obvious path. The creeping “Dropped” is a prime example, skulking along on the back of a fuzzed bass-line and understated guitar licks before ramping things up in the chorus.
Similarly, “Can’t Quite Manage” shapes as a blues dirge before morphing into a Beasts of Bourbon-styled fast shuffle with country-flecked guitars. This one sounds like a message to a drug-fucked significant other. “All Falls Apart” vaguely echoes Chain’s chain gang “Black and Blue” before erupting into a magnificent sonic cacophony.
You can’t capture Jack Davies' on-stage antics on record but this record’s the next best thing. He’s a rare talent, alternately snarling or blues-shouting his way through these seven songs like a pub rock veteran with three decades service under his belt. Guitarists Brendan Charlie and Chris Taranto are perfect foils for him and each other - one listen to opening track “Putain de Merde” (it’s French for “fucking shit”) should convince you of that.
Behind every great rock and roll band is a great engine room and “Been Low” the is gem among this lot with its wrecking ball swing and massed backing vocals, while the boogie-ish “Col. Party” varies the speed to pub rock rave-up.
“Eat Your Young” is on French label Beast Records whose taste for all things excellent (especially from Australia) is beyond dispute. It’s on vinyl (naturally enough) or available as a download. As usual, the link appears below.
3/4
Bitter Sweet Kicks on Bandcamp
Tags: beast records, beasts of bourbon, st kilda, bitter sweet kicks, eat your young
