WORDS BY VON GOLOKA
Crows “Beware Believers” Out On Bad Vibrations Records. Release date 1st April 2022.
Creating an almighty racket since 2015 London post punk ensemble “Crows” have finally overcome supply chain issues and released their second and highly anticipated long player “Beware Believers” on Bad Vibrations Records having had their steady rise rudely interrupted by a global health emergency with its distribution seemingly under the auspices of the mighty Fuzz club conglomerate who have been purveying alternative goodness for a decade or so now. Straight away that tells us that we are going to be going into hard, frantic, no nonsense guitar territory with pounding drums and dirty bass supporting proceedings and yes both sides of the LP are overdriven to the maximum with growling and urgent riffing from start to finish. Eleven songs full of it, in fact.
What is so compelling about “Beware believers” however is its authenticity. You see “post punk” as a descriptor is banded around all over the place tagging all manner of junk and debris that really doesn’t deserve, or has earned the right, to call itself such a thing but “Crows” actually is post punk. Because what “Crows” have done on “Beware believers” is perfectly capture that raucous energy that flourished at the turn of the eighties (certainly in the UK) when angry youth combined diametrically opposed influences as far apart as The Sex Pistols to Hawkwind and distilled them in grubby practice rooms underneath railway arches in Camden town and a million other damp hovels up and down the land to create the power of doom laden, hard rocking and politically revolutionary squat rock that was the contemporary, true post punk phenomena as exemplified by the likes of Killing Joke, Inner City Unit and The Cult. That is the crux of it as “Crows” have discovered the alchemy to emulate these sounds so perfectly and that’s what you’ll get on “Beware Believers” in spades.
So…. the legacy sounds re-created by “Crows” on “Beware Believers” are not only a blistering testament to those remarkable times but also fully deserve your attention if you really believe that time travel is possible and want the visceral experience of this genre of music to back stop your musical enlightenment. And why wouldn’t you? Because there is no doubt that had “Crows” recorded back in the day then they’d have enjoyed regular airplay with John Peel and mightily disturbed the establishment and I for one can’t think of a better compliment. Discuss.
Stand out track “Sad lad” for lovers of The Cult of Dom Keller and The Cosmic Dead and epic overdriven workouts in general..
8/10
BEWARE BELIEVERS TRACK LISTING
1/ CLOSER STILL
2/ GARDEN OF ENGLAND
3/ ONLY TIME
4/ SLOWLY SEPARATE
5/ MODERATION
6/ HEALING
7/ ROOM 156
8/ MEANWHILE
9/ WILD EYED & LOATHSOME
10/ THE SERVANT
11/ SAD LAD
CROWS TOUR
14/03 – 20/03/22 – Austin (Texas) @ SXSW03/04/22 – Brighton, UK @ Resident (In Store / Signing)05/04/22 – Bristol, UK @ The Exchange06/04/22 – Cardiff, UK @ Clwb Ifor Bach08/04/22 – Manchester, UK @ YES09/04/22 – Birmingham, UK @ Muthers Studio10/04/22 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club11/04/22 – Glasgow, UK @ The Garage12/04/22 – Sheffield, UK @ Sidney & Matilda13/04/22 – London, UK @ Scala 17/04/22 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso 18/04/22 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique 20/04/22 – Hamburg, DE @ Molotow21/04/22 – Berlin, DE @ Frannz Club
FOLLOW CROWS
My life is a soundtrack, i track my life through music, photography is my passion, my escape, my expression. Without both i have pieces missing, thankfully i’m blessed and get to combine both.
Born in Manchester, lived in Australia for 22 years where i was heavily involved in the Australian Music Industry, firstly in bands (Singer) and then managing bands (all original), I moved back to the UK, Wales specifically 10 years ago and married my childhood sweetheart and life is good.
