Mike Diver: The formula’s simple: some hardcore dudes, playing straight-up, straightforward hardcore, to knuckle-brained hardcore kids looking to punch each other in the face, hard.
THWACK
Adam Anonymous: But sometimes simple is all you need. A punch to the face gives you the painful lows to put soaring highs into context. And bucket-loads of aggression needn't always equal hairy hands being dragged into seething circle pits...
MD*: There are no real gimmicks to speak of – unless you consider Some Girls*’ culled-from-other-bands line-up to be their gimmick; if you don't know who make up their number (five) already, then you're reading the wrong review – and no real compositional invention or sparkling lyrical intellect: listen to ‘Marry Mortuary’ or ‘Dead In A Web’ for examples of mean-nothing-said-swiftly (and loudly) gobbledygook dressed up as worthwhile comment. This is the epitome of an it-is-what-it-is album: simple, fast, punk rock music for bodies to get bloody to.
AA*: Supergroups should be banned. Totally. Take Some Girls' close cousins, *Head Wound City. Then make some unkind reference involving the words 'sum' and 'parts'. But this is a cunning wolf in a dumb wolf's clothing; while heartlessly slamming your head against a concrete floor repeatedly, it's impossible not to get the message eventually. And they're angry about something: religion. As on, cunningly, 'Religion II'. Why d'you think the lyrics are the only track in 13 that are notably absent from the disc's booklet (well, that and it being a cover of Public Image Ltd)? We're somewhere between going-to-hell blasphemy and, well, the truth.
*MD*: Of course, the band don’t totally see it from a violent point of view – they’ll gladly tell anyone that asks that their shows aren’t about overt aggression, even if their drummer proudly states on the record’s press release that that band wish to brutalise people – but only the narrowest of ear canals couldn’t detect the obvious M.O. of Heaven’s Pregnant Teens. The intensity of its content can’t be faulted, but soon the formula’s repetitive simplicity sows the seeds of indifference and ignorance, and later almost total listener shutdown. What begins as a riot fades to nothing more, really, than some mildly irritating background music.
*AA*: Background music for psychopaths maybe, but at under half an hour, there's little time to get bored, less still to think about this as much as Heaven's Pregnant Teens deserves. And 'Deathface'...
*MD*: Okay, so Some Girls do toss a curveball come the album’s close – ‘Deathface’ unravels over many more minutes than the preceding twelve tracks – but it contains the same old ideas, i.e. nothing to really warrant its length: “Ape, ape, ape…” come the closing chants, over and over. ‘Til the eruptive, merciful end.
“I couldn’t care less what I say,” states the 'singer' for the record. Well, good for you. For much of this album, neither could we. A 5/10 from me.
*AA*: “We also wanted to punish,” adds guitarist Chuck Rowell, “and I mean seriously punish, people.” Which is playfully, piss-extractingly faux-crazy enough to at least found a decent argument. And for that matter, a warrior cry for the best LP of an infant 2006 thus far - 9/10 in fact - in convinced eyes...
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7Mike Diver's Score