Northern Punk Leeds the way!
It's official, the North is the new home of Punk Rock. Leeds in particular is flying the anarchic flag high with The Dead Pets, Guns On The Roof, and here with The Dauntless Elite. Whilst the rest of the country, and for the most part the world, have taken Punk, moulded it into Pop/Punk, and then inflated the Pop element and chipped off a lot of the Punk, here it is refreshing to have Punk played the way it should be - good honest with a slight hangover rough-around-the-edges feel to it.
From the opening track Saliva there is a hard-as-nails backbone to the tracks with the gravelly vocals, and honesty that is proud of their northern roots. We have no American, or universal accents here, no this is pure Yorkshire through and through! With a beautiful mix of potent lyrics ("Every ducks back needs a break from the water // and sometimes fuck off was the only good answer") and selected riffs, that mix chugging with big melodies, you get something special. God Doesn't Believe I Exist follows on perfectly suggesting that the track order has been carefully selected and not just randomly thrown together. Better Than Nowt smashes out of the speakers, before the fantastic song Fizz gets in your head with thoughtful verses and a big chorus, however it's the lightning-quick-frenzy of I Don't Want To Be A Transhuman that has an everlasting effect. This is Punk Rock the form of which God intended: fast and punchy with some great lyrics waxing about non-conforming to the current trends of life. An example of the wondrous joy that is fist-pumping, freedom of speech to an anthem backdrop. Great stuff!
The mid-tempo stomp of Jack The Rippy has classic sing-along elements that spit out with snarling affection, whilst Danson In The Dark (Don't Ask Me) is well constructed starting off with a thick bass line and with chugging guitars layered on top. This is a thinking man's Punk Rock, giving us great lyrics of, "Huddle In and butter up the criminal // Grease the pedestal. How's it sound?" Weighed Down Blues has that Street Punk feel likened to The Briggs or The Casualties, whereby The Dauntless Elite take a well-tried formula and given it their own unique spin. Elsewhere Motion Sickness sounds like the great Hungarian band Bankrupt; then we have the wonderful Silent Running which builds up then cuts back musically back-and-forth that works well, and shows that they are more than 'just a Punk Band', giving us an insight into to life in the future. Thinkles gives us more accessible Punk Rock before last song, the great titled Sod This For A Game Of soldiers which again has progressive parts, and finishes off the album with the proverbial cherry on top.
The ex-members of Joe Ninety and Fig 4.0 have brought together one of the best Punk albums since The Strawberry Blondes last offering, mixing up the fast and furious beats and guitars, with the true Punk ethos which is to complain about the state of the world in a down-to-earth way which musically is raw and not over-produced. Rock on!