East Meets West - Svetlanas / New Cold War Split 7"

Written by GE 138.

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In what hearkens back to a nice nod to the glory days of Punk when you'd find releases like these more common than you do now, what you have here is a split 7" by an odd coupling of bands - the Svetlanas, a crazy as fuck Punk band so notorious they were banned and exiled from their native land of Russia, and then on the other side of this release you have Local stalwarts New Cold War, who have no Communist leanings that I'm aware of. Aware of. This was recorded during a recent Svetlanas tour stop through Vegas, where the band was put into Camel Hump Studios to record their tracks pretty much spontaneously and probably in one take or less. Brilliant. The Svetlanas stuff sounds great, very Plasmatics sounding, tight and catchy Punk Rock ala the Dwarves or Naked Aggression even. They deliver 2 short, fast blasts of melodic, guitar heavy anger that may be sung in English or might be sung in Russian, I dunno. Doesn't really matter because both songs the Svetlanas do are catchy as fuck and very memorable. Again, they sound great and you should check the Svetlanas out as soon as you get the chance. On the flipside of this release we have a couple of songs that I recognize from seeing New Cold War perform as often as I have, a couple of songs so fucking good that The Bouncing Souls themselves would wish they had written them. Never Coming Home has the most passionate plea chorus about never going home that I've ever heard. John Brown howls that hook like a wounded animal and I love it. Been stuck in my head for days, dammit. The vocals remind me of Gameface, for some reason, except when Cody sings, then it all Rancid, all the time. Cody's bass playing in this group shows off a lot more of his talent on bass than his other band The People's Whiskey does,  that's for sure. The guitar work, as always, is intricate and intertwining, lighting quick dexterous riffs heavy on hooks and sounding BIG. The second song, Burn, is a rager, honed to a circle pit inducing sharpness that is frightening in it's stop / start quickness. The drumming is phenomenal, going from pounding like a jackhammer fast to a swinging hard enough to knock down walls march on the drop of a hat. Both songs are epic, in that they're so well written, they're so original, so interesting, so catchy, that it's easy to see why when people who see New Cold War once are immediately fans for life. Their music is that good and it's a crime that they're not bigger than they already are. New Cold War are one of the most underrated bands in Las Vegas, and I hope that this split release with the Svetlanas does a lot to remedy that situation. Check this shit out pronto!!

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Brought to you by the fine folks at Squid Hat Records. You can order this split release on limited edition 2 tone 7" vinyl by clicking here, or, you can stream / download it digitally by clicking here. It's also available on Spotify (click here), Amazon (click here), and wherever else music is marketed to the masses. Oh, this release also has it's own Facebook page, which you can go to by clicking here.

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