The Hard-Ons: I'm Sorry Sir, That Riff's Already Been Taken

- Spring time and camping, eggs and halloumi, coffee and a smoke, Brett Lee and Bollywood. All of what we just listed are combinations made up of parts that are top shelf by themselves. It is once they contribute together to a whole, however, that they rise to an entirely different level. Now, I want you to take that theory-establishing preamble and apply it to this new record from The Hard-Ons. The long-standing stalwarts have kept the metre ticking over and now, they’ve only gone and bloody co-opted Tim Rogers into the fold. Rogers must be having an absolute blast living out every young guitarist’s dream of playing with a band they love. You get the feeling is mutual. There’s an audible smile across this album. The combination have amassed an array of hooks that would make Jarvis Walker’s warehouse look like baby’s first tacklebox.

Hold Tight is a song so catchy you scratch your head to work out if you’ve heard it before. The sense of nostalgic warmth that washes over you from its driving guitars and thumping drums transmutes into this infectious tune that assimilates itself with your grey matter. Roger’s voice is encased in sugary harmonies that galvanise the earlier point of being the best of both parties. Speaking of parties, Fucked Up Party laments an all too familiar tale. Well-honed pop sensibilities are brought from the opener and an ever so slight tinge of aggression is brought about. You’ll chuckle at lines that we’ve all thought before in “I can’t wait until the night is over” and “I’m dying to catch that cab”. The belly does birth this slicker-than-cum-on-a-gold-tooth transition into melodic punk beauty wrapped around an existential crisis. More contagious (sorry if the daily pressers have people squirming with the ick from hearing that too often) sing-a-longs are deftly deployed on Lite As A Feather. Each component reinforces the other to etch melodies into that subconscious part of your brain where they’ll pop up whenever they feel like it and remain there for a pleasant while. Flittering guitars mingle with skipping drums in the early goings. Doing so makes the wall of chords even more grand.

The three shortest songs and ironically the longest have all taken the lead from one Classy Freddie Blassie in filing their teeth to give the record some bite. All motor forward a from thrashing and bashing instrumental but Frequencies, being the longest of the bunch, has room to play some more tricks. Its permeated by exhales of white noise while Rogers manically declares visions of endless spiders. A lull before the close in the form of Needles & Pins (sic) goes all-in on the harmonies; glorious harmonies. A gentler song adorned with lavish keys that rise in sync towards the chorus and make it oh so dreamy. Now take all the positive descriptors, and format paint them over the closer Shoot Me In The Back. It straddles the guitar-hardened edge of the speedier songs while basting them in the honeyed hooks. When a closer can so eloquently summarise all the cherry picked elements of a record it leaves you with an overwhelmingly positive glow.

When you find a combination of equally stellar parts as this record has done, you wonder why it took so long for it to become a thing in the first place. Whilst maintaining their innate D.I.Y likeability this power couple has landed on some power-pop flair to make the whole thing more. I could go on and on….and on...but I’ll leave you with this: go and look at the packaging; you knew this was going to be this good.

- Matt Lynch.
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