This album is so much fun. It is a Texas Instruments talking calculator of a record. It is a life-sized replica Galaga arcade game of an album. It is a polystyrene Big Mac box of an LP. It is as 1980s as Drew Barrymore looking quizzically at ET.
I know, I have may have lost many of you at the 1980s references – because it is likely that mentions of the so-called “decade that taste forgot” will conjure musical images of Stock-Aitken-and-Waterman dross, or hair-sprayed party metal.
But New Skeletal Faces’ influences come from a darker, grimier version of the era that was fuelled by mind-altering food colouring and hydrogenated fat. The part that gave rise to bands like Alien Sex Fiend, Christian Death and the earliest incarnation of TSOL.
They have augmented their love of death rock (for that is what the genre was known as, fact fans) with a portion of early black metal and LA glam to produce a worthy homage to people in skinny jeans, cheap black hair dye, kohl eyeliner and big, big leather jackets, without sounding stale.
The sound of the album, with a treble-heavy, flanged guitar and dominant, picked bass, is deliberate. They enlisted Bill Metoyer as producer, the guy who made Slayer’s debut album Show No Mercy sound like it did, and helped shape the soundtrack to a zillion swimming-pool skate sessions by producing the likes of Flotsam and Jetsam and DRI.
Speaking of skateboarding, on first listen to this record, I was taken back to ancient VHS skate videos, whose soundtracks often had songs from death-rock bands to offset the Black Flag and DRI hardcore (not that I knew what death rock was back then, I just classed it as “kind of punk but with a spooky edge”). Indeed, the lead single and title track from Until the Night sounds ready made for a segment featuring Steve Alba abusing curved slabs of concrete. It is punk enough to get the active kids dancing, but dark enough for the morose ones to skulk in the corner.
And, the cool thing is that the band only formed in 2017, with the aim, according to their press release, of blurring the “genre lines between all manners of darkness in music”. Words and phrases like “wild”, “untamed” and “1980’s Sunset Strip in an alternate universe from hell” are also in the press release – and they all stand up to scrutiny on hearing this album. Hell, the reference to Sunset Strip is plain to hear in the opening bars of the first track, ‘Disexist’, which sounds (in a good way) like zombies running through some Mötley Crüe riffs . Even if the phrases didn’t pass muster, if I met the band members, I am not sure I would have the courage to argue against them.
Vocalist Errol Fritz, who also plays guitar, has an unnerving style which sits in between Quorthon-of-Balthory rasps and John Lydon-esque wails – it is showcased ideally on ‘Ossuary Lust’, which starts out like a slab of mid-tempo 80s thrash then ossifies (sorry, I couldn’t resist) in the chorus into a take on early forays into black metal. It works, honestly.
The next song ‘Womb’ sounds like what could have happened if Lydon had turned to metal with Public Image Limited after Metal Box, instead of disappearing down the eventual weird disco-cum-art-rock rabbit-hole. Fritz combines meaty palm-muted riffage with shimmering guitar lines that could have come from The Cure’s early efforts.
Behind Fritz, bassist KRO’s liquid lines with heavy involvement with the upper notes of the instrument add to the 80s feel to the album – but when his rapidly picked strings lock in with the double-kicks of Don Void on drums, you are reminded that this is no pastiche of spooky old music. When these guys want to thrash, they do.
To emphasise their influences, the final song is a cover from Balthory, a faithful rendition of ‘Raise the Dead’, albeit with a glossier sheen than the original from the Swedes. It is done with gusto – clearly their leather vests and gloves, heavy jewellery, teased hair and eye make-up isn’t just for show. They are true (trve?) believers.
But I stand by my original conclusion, that this album would be excellent to accompany a skate session on a bowl made of brimstone, festooned with graffiti of skulls and ancient thrash-band logos, and where the only tricks possible are grinds, airs and life-threatening carves.
Or, if you’re not into skateboarding, the entire album is ready-made for an occult-themed retro party – squeeze a few of these songs in between those from early PiL, Bauhaus and maybe even the Misfits into a playlist and all the kids will think you’re cool. Either way, this album is well worth your time.
