Music Reviews: The Jackhammers - "Give 'Em Enough Dope"

Punk rock has had many different styles over the years. But the best punk rock is when a band simply plugs into an amp, hits the distortion pedal and just goes nuts playing loud and being obnoxious. It's just a basic animalistic instinct with true punk rockers. If people get it, cool. If not, even better! Glasgow's The Jackhammers play old school punk rock. Loud, fast, obnoxious, vulgar. The kinda punk that would make your parents think you've lost your mind. And I like it!

The bands newest album is called "Give 'Em Enough Dope". The title is a knock off of the second album by the Clash. But the sound is more 80's aggro in it's sound and presentation than The Clash were. But at the same time they tip the hat to bands like the Sex Pistols and The Damned on songs like "Punk Rules" and "Tourettes Lautrec". These are classic distortion driven songs that make you clench your fists and scream out loud in excitement. Get ready people, it's about to get rowdy in here!

The band, Jim Shit (vocals/bass), Andy Drankit (drums), Horace Cockpuppet (guitar) and Albert Scunge (guitar) play hard and keep it simple with 3 chord punk anthems like the 70's sounding "Flesh Gridlock" and "Bingo Wings Breakout". But they also have enough aggressive angst to spit out tunes with titles like "Used Rubber" and "The World Is My Toilet". It may be 2012, but these lads are still pissed off, ripped off and screwed by the world around them. And they don't care who knows or what you think about it! That is the sign of classic in your face punk rock. The sound that brought it into the world in the first place.

They wanna get the pit started with "Retard Masterplan" and it's none stop elbows and knuckles the rest of the way. The album is definitely made to slam to. It makes you feel the anger and frustration that they feel on tracks like "Bags Of Dogshit" and "You're All Dead". If you can't take it raw and in your face, I would suggest staying away from this album. If you can still get down and dirty slamming in the pit and raising your fist in unison, this album is for you. 

Lets face it, punk rock was never meant to be homogenized and kid friendly (take that Billie Joe Armstrong). It was meant to let society know that we're individuals who have a right to say, think and feel what we want. And let it be known that we WON'T conform to things we don't feel comfortable with. We have a voice and we're gonna use it to let you know what we think is wrong with the world. That way of thinking and punk rock in general may have gone to the dogs in recent years, but it's refreshing to see bands like The Jackhammers are around reminding us that this style and attitude is still alive and kicking.

 4 / 5 stars