With the widespread misery of the burning world and the hottest summer of your life (so far), the background level of ‘everything is terrible’ has been notably cranking up a couple of notches this year. Could it be that Louse are the hot sound of now? The sound of being trapped in a hot car stuck in traffic, squeezed uncomfortably in the middle of the back seat, the warm, still, air thick with resentment. Relentless and unpleasant, Buyer’s Remorse is a cheap ‘n’ nasty bottle of bad vibes to pair perfectly with your growing misanthropy and dwindling supply of hope.
Still, on the bright side, at least you’re not trapped in here with James Corden and The Red Hot Chili Peppers. With their tops off. Singing. The brutally bleak noise rock Louse deal in is mercifully too hateful and grinding to ever suffer such a fate. It’s low rent and uncomplicated, hammering repetition and distortion. Comparisons with fellow noise bastards The Shits are as inevitable as they are pointless. Taped together like buy-one-get-one-free packs of Poundland Brainbombs, the bands have shared a split release, a couple of members, and their riff. Both offering their own takes on the same ugly, degenerate, scum rock, noise. What’s your flava? Louse don’t give a toss.
As titles go Buyer’s Remorse might seem something of a hostage to fortune but then again the anguished vocals make the lyrical content barely decipherable, which can only help you to come away feeling a little less soiled by the whole sorry business. Progression being anathema to this kind of thing it should really sound just like their debut Creep Call and, well, it does, but Louse are not so wilfully obstinate as to not change it up a little bit. It could just be novelty of course but I think this one’s a touch harder, meaner, and uglier than it’s predecessor.
The winding, jangling, intro to ‘Rags and Tatters’ puts me briefly in mind of The Cramps, which is no bad thing. Mostly though it’s squealing feedback, a satisfyingly dumb riff and away we go, the thick layers of grime and distortion carried by unstoppable drums. Sometimes this type of stuff gets dragged down to a weary, defeated, plod but Louse keep it rhythmically vicious and bad tempered and are all the better for it. ‘Legal Loophole’ is a flat out rager and then ‘Wheel’ pushes even harder. Success seems an odd way to think about it considering the overbearing aura of failure, criminality, and self disgust but the boys have made a decent job of this.
“Tell me now, would you recognise the characterisation of this music as ‘horrible, scum rock, negative punk filth’?”
“Abjection, your honour!”
