Like many greats who die too soon, Mclusky were just too good for this world. Even at their most spiteful (which was pretty much all the time), the recently disbanded Welsh power-punk trio were campaigning for a better life, ideally one rid of people who buy James Blunt records. It's a struggle ex-Mcluskyite John Chapple admirably continues with his own trio Shooting at Unarmed Men, a band that actually predates Mclusky, but whose own scabrous sludge-punk will inevitably be measured against the latter's redoubtable brand of same. A formidable task, to be sure, but hey, some people prefer Wings to the Beatles.
In Mclusky, Chapple was the gangly, ginger-haired foil to skinheaded frontman Andy Falkous and his serial-killer stare, so it follows that SAUM is a more spastic, untamed proposition, full of nervous energy but without Mclusky's steely precision or punishing heaviosity. Yes! Tinnitus! could pass as an early 1990s Touch & Go curio, albeit one whose murky, mid-fi production didn't age well. While "Pathos at Bathos" stalks its dimly lit turf with a stuttering Jesus Lizardian bass prowl and staccato guitar stabs-- and "Never Follow Me Again" even lifts the murderous start/stop riff from the Lizard's "Seasick"-- the wet-sandbag effect of Steve Morgan's drum sound diffuses the songs' seething intensity; instead of getting our skulls crushed, they're just lightly bruised. Likewise, the feral, punching-bag onslaughts of "A Horse By Day Is a Horse By Night" and "I Am United Nations" would probably decapitate you in a live setting, but merely make you flinch in their recorded incarnation. What's missing here isn't so much Falkous, but rather Steve Albini behind the boards.
If Yes! Tinnitus! is sorely lacking muscle in the moments where it should be flexing it, Chapple has at least retained Mclusky's knack for undercutting the hoarse-throat hysterics with perversely melodic turns (not to mention ridiculous song titles)-- to wit, two-chord Pavement-pounding closer "In-Flight Instructions Are a Joke, Say I", which cheers on its female protagonist into an alcohol-induced stupor with handclaps and a rousing southern rock chorus. And like Falkous, the man can reduce the most confident, self-assured man to a whimpering ninny with a single devastating one-liner ("I hope you like listening to music made for girls"). So even if Chapple and crew sound like they'd have trouble winning an arm wrestling match, when it comes to a war of words, we're so dead.
