Hell f’n yes! A much-needed shot of adrenalin right here! The Steaknives, from Italy, are back with their debut LP that is nothing short of killer. Mix up early L.A. punk like the Bags with early hardcore and you get these guys. The songs have urgency, are delivered with convincing attitude, and the playing is as raw as it is razor sharp. They never really jump into super speedy assaults (“Big Money” is about as fast as they get and it still packs a wallop!), which allows them to retain the power and the punch of the music with mid tempos, and time changes to bring everything down to a knuckle-dragging lurch that reminds me of early ‘80s OC hardcore. All the songs are great. Not one clunker in the mix. The title track has a nice dose of urgency that shifts between fast to mid tempo without missing a beat. The vocal delivery kind of reminds me of Frank Discussion. Whoa! Decent cover of Bad Brains’ “Big Takeover”. However, I would prefer to hear another original song from these guys. Great record. Hunt this fucker down. I’m on the search for their debut EP from a couple years back.
–M.Avrg (White Zoo, whitezoorecords.com)