Released 13th April, Dead Again Records

Video Nasties are an intriguing, block-rockin mash-up of musical styles. At  once seemingly appealing to the metal crowd, they also do a deceptive line in
pop tunes and hooks.    

 Opener ‘HNB’ is a thrashy, guttural number with pounding unrelenting drums and guitar riff  that wouldn’t be out of place at Download.

 However, its not particularly representative of the album as a whole as underneath the constantly thrashy guitars lie an absolute wealth of melody.  Previous single ‘Jellybean’ sounds.A.Lot.Like.The.Strokes.  This is in no way a slight as it's a great track, and lead singer James Ridout's vocals have that classic lackadaisical  going-nowhere-fast- lilt of Julian Casablancas.

‘Old Flowers’ bathes in reverb andan echoey vocal.  It’s as if A Place To
Bury Strangers decided they wanted to make a sing-a-long track, to go with theendless noise they revel in .  ‘DeadAgain’ is very different indeed, with a poppy bassline and angsty lyric of ‘Im in hell again/I’m in Hell agaaaaaaaaaain’.  Once again, there’s a lot of reverb, but it works and adds some necessary tension to proceedings.

‘Conversation Dies’ kicks off like a mid-90’s Britpop track and is one of the strongest  on here, the second of a awesome mid-album triumvirate that is finished by the wonderful ‘Albatross’.  A little over two minutes long, it is a lesson in musical economy because it is utterly fantastic, one of my favourite tracks of the year.  Starting with Ridout screaming relentlessly over Garage-Rock drums and guitar, it didn’t appeal too much at first.  Yet in a flash the whole concept of the song changes and we are back in the 90’s Cool Britannia with a glorious hook,  some electric guitar that could grace the quieter moments of Guns N’ Roses and a ‘have you seen my albatross’
lyric that begs, nay, demands, to be screeched along with.  If this all sounds
a bit confused, its not.

‘Rolling’ is a slowie, their equivalent of a weeper with its wall of sound and ‘maybe you’ve found somebody new/maybe I have too.’ It’ll get leggings dropping up and down the country when the Nasties tour in Aprl. ‘Kaiser’ picks up the pace of before epic penultimate track ‘Teenage Celebration’ sees the boys up the ante, and embark on a 7 minute journey through their musical influences.  They touch on all the styles previously mentioned, from the stoner Stokes of ‘we were smoking doobies’ , to a frantic, crashing rhythm section, twanging guitar chorus, a sing-a-long chorus of ‘won’t you come back to my house’ that doesn’t come in until over 3 minutes in, and a cock rock guitar
dripping in reverb to top it all off.

This and ‘Albatross’ are Video Nasties in a nutshell.  They are magnificently non-scene, there is no hint of indie-electro here.  Its big, its
loud, its not trying to fit in with any publications ideas of what’s cool but,
crucially, in spite of all this its goddam accessible. Whether or not it’ll
stand the test of time is another thing but here, now, its refreshing to listen
to a band taking risks and just thrashing out some tunes.

 Bored of the new music 'scene'?? If not, why not??? Difference between a video nasty and snuff?

Posted In Album Reviews, Apr 13 2009. Words - David