By Jim Rowland
Forming in 2021, and featuring former members of The Amorettes, Tequila Mockingbyrd and Aaron Buchanan & The Cult Classics, Buckinghamshire multi-coloured all-girl pop rockers The Hot Damn! have honed their chops in the best way possible – through hard graft on the road for the past three years. Now they’re finally ready to unleash their debut album, ‘Dancing On The Milky Way’.
I caught The Hot Damn! live last year when they came to town supporting Hayseed Dixie, and their impressive set was certainly colourful. But if that live set was colourful, this album is positively techni-coloured. Recorded in Melbourne, Australia with producer Ricki Rae and Doncaster, ÜK, with Matt Elliss, ‘Dancing On The Milky Way’ brings together 12 tracks of bright, powerful pop rock that will blow your luminous socks off. The production is pretty immense, the playing great, and the vocals, very much including the lush harmonies, quite outstanding.
From the hugely catchy pop-rock of ‘Fizz Buzz Crash’, ‘Dance Around’ and ‘I Didn’t Like You Anyway’, to the glam rock rhythms of ‘Jukebox on the Radio’, the heavier ‘DAMN!DAMN!DAMN!DAMN!’ and ‘Going Down’ and the anthemic ‘Live Laugh Love’, these are finely crafted songs packing a plethora of ultra-catchy choruses.
New single ‘Automatic’ offers something slightly different and a gritty commercial pop edge, ‘About Last Night’ hints at where those Blondie comparisons may be coming from and ‘Loud and Clear’ has the kind of upbeat AOR edge you might expect from the great Cats In Space. The raunchy, moody rock ballad ‘Sticky Clubs’ rounds things off in fine style.
Offerings hints of acts like Cheap Trick and Enuff’z’nuff to The Darkness, The Cars, Blondie and even Kim Wylde in places, but very much with its own identity, this is top notch pop-rock/power-pop with a quality production.
Hugely impressive for a debut album, and built for rock radio, ‘Dancing On The Milky Way’ has all the qualities to be a sizeable hit.
- ‘Dancing On The Milky Way’ will be released on Friday (27 September).
- The Hot Damn! Tour in November:
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