By DJ Monk
Fancy having your head ripped off by an angry Viking, who consequently grabs your decapitated skull by the hair, rams it up your arsehole and pulls it back up through your body, replaces it on your severed neck, spits in your mouth and bids you welcome to Valhalla, where they’ll be playing football with said skull for the rest of eternity? Well, that is the sort of effect you’ll feel when the first riff of this, the debut EP from north eastern rockers Spiders From Saigon, pummels itself fist-first into the bridge of your nose, commanding you to sit up and pay attention otherwise you will receive the punishment due…
Now, given both the band name and the artwork for this, the combo’s debut EP, I was expecting either some bunch of spandex clad glamsters or a group of flare-wearing stoners… but, you should never judge a book, or a CD, by its cover, and, proving that initial appearances, and preconceptions, can indeed be extremely deceptive, SFS prove to be a totally different beast altogether. Yes, there are psych and stoner influences in there, but this mysterious mob concentrate more on delivering classic rock-tinged, doom-fuelled concrete-solid riffs that don’t mess about when it comes to pummelling you into aural submission.
I called them “mysterious”: that is because their Facebook page reveals almost zero information about them. How many are in the band? Dunno. What are their names? Equally, nada. Maybe they like it that way, and it does add an air of mythos to the listening experience, making you concentrate on the music without any preconceptions about possible previous band associations… hey, whatever is cool for you guys, ‘cos all the matters at the end of the day is the quality of the music – and in that regard, these Saigonese arachnids definitely do deliver a powerful statement of intent.
- ‘Shattered Hearts’ is out now.
www.facebook.com/SpidersFromSaigon
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