Here’s a nice little EP that made my “to get to” list in the 2013 post (I have since purchased all these records but still have yet to listen to all of them…holy shit.)

This band is way too cool to call this the Poison Arrow EP and put that song first but it’s clearly the hit and worth the price of admission. In fact, I’m a little bummed they didn’t put it on a full album. Because I don’t have any of their full albums, and I feel a little guilty. Cause they’re from New Jersey, not even simply New Jersey but New Brunswick and I kinda feel like “that’s my scene, man”, even though clearly it’s not anymore and even was it ever? Not really. But I’ve heard them, and I like them. Which should be enough to buy a band’s records. I shouldn’t have to feel obligated because I might run into them at a party or something. It could happen. The kind of party I don’t really expect to be invited to, but then when I am, I don’t show up anyway. Because I got some stuff to figure out, man. There’s just so many bands. And so many old records by old bands. This may even qualify for some people in both of those categories. I never really got that attitude.

But this is hardly a monolith of relevance as a release. It’s good as a starting point, but I’m going to have to get more if I really claim to give a shit. I mean, come on, me. We got a tracklist with 7 songs, but everyone that isn’t Poison Arrow is under 3 minutes. They’re just collecting the songs that don’t belong on a proper album, maybe they don’t even consider them finished. You got midtempo groover Sick Bed, the quick melodic hardcore-ish Crushing the Kingdom, acoustic ballad Bad Men, angular noise rock of Wrecking Ball—some great screams here, frontwoman Marissa has a great singing voice but the moniker’s not too ironic—also the quieter but still tense bongo rock of Into the Sun and a nice little end ditty feat. Shellshag, another one of those bands I should know real well from 10 years back, but I do just barely.

And the artwork doesn’t merely look like a demo tape as a retro gag, it really came out on tape. Only a hundred copies. I never really got that either, I’m not that kind of collector. Download is fine. %