Brighton’s Lower Slaughter have never met a riff that they couldn’t riff on top of. The four-piece’s debut album is an almighty festival of sludgy, muscular guitars and screamo vocals that is fast and furious and for anyone too young to remember Nirvana the first time around. Aside from a brief guitar instrumental, the band only take interest in one gear, and that is full throttle and very loud.
From the assertive, speed riffage of ‘Tied Down’ to the indefatigable howl of ‘Call From The Abyss’, ‘What Big Eyes’ gives the same thrill you might expect to get from clinging to the roof of a bullet train whilst listening to Pissed Jeans. Amidst the fun and games of this grungy hardcore punk, though, singer Sinead Young takes the chance to vent her real anger. “We’re trying to fix our lives, but we just don’t have the riches / We’ve been dying like this for years,” she screams on ‘Take It’. On standout track ‘Earth Seed’, over apocalyptic drums and scorched-earth guitar, she declares, “In order to rise from its own ashes, first a phoenix must burn.” This is catharsis in youthful noise.
