The Punch House – The Punch House EP

Popping up from the Manchurian music scene is The Punch House, a duo from ‘the Reddish/Gorton Badlands’. Well, all I can say that it can’t be all bad with multi-instrumentalists Phil and Tom giving us their first offering for the wider public in their self-titled 5-track EP. When you listen to their songs there’s a definite nod to more than a few flagstone bands, you can’t fail to hear Elbow/Radiohead-esque harmonies and instrumentation coming across but in saying this The Punch House still offer their own style.

Beginning with the laid back ‘Parade’ the Elbow influence is clear. Featuring sustained chords on keyboard and mellow guitar riffs which intertwine with each other gives the EP a good start and eases the listener in and engages them with new layers of sounds and patterns. ‘Never Once’ continues where the previous left off, is slightly more lively with a few catchy guitar riffs complimenting the vocals.

The highlight of the EP is definitely ‘Rust’ a piece which has more action both instrumentally and vocally, the tempo is upped but not at the expense of some nice bits of writing and the harmonies are quite adventurous too. The chord progressions and riffs on guitar make the piece quite catchy – it’s just a shame that this was the shortest piece on the EP. ‘Rust’ is balanced nicely with ‘Targets’ and let you hear the potential of the band. There are some quite ghostly sounding harmonies both in this song and ‘Flashlights’ where the band use different effects on the guitar to add to the ethereal feel of the pieces.

There are a few surprises in terms of the writing – you expect the music to do something and it goes in a totally different direction, the same goes with the harmonisations, bold but work well and show that The Punch House aren’t ones to back down from trying and experimenting with different sounds and techniques. The vocals compliment the writing style and instruments nicely allowing you to hear the instrumentation without being distracted by lyrics and too many voices. (With the number of effects going on you couldn’t help but feel that two voices were plenty).

While the influences of a number of bands can be heard this duo are no cover band and come onto the scene with their own boldness in writing which suggest that The Punch House have a lot to offer.

Released March 12 2012 through Bandcamp

Posted by Angela Jaap

Tags: Angela Jaap, Bandcamp, ep, EP Review, The Punch House