BABY CONTROL - BEST WAR (CD)

special offer! "Zoë Verkuylen (The Red Light Sting), Mark Colavecchia (North Of America), Dan Tompkins (Got To Get Got), and Chris Vanderlaan (Animal Names / Buzzing Bees). The pursuit for a contemporary definition of "punk" is stretched and incessant. While current splinters now imply a rigid set of sonic rules dictating a specific tempo, tone and simplicity, or, more perplexing, a chain store consumerist and mall rock slant, one can't help but question if these modern variations in any way retain the spirit from which punk was birthed. Baby Control's debut full-length, Best War, undeniably captures something along the lines of what punk spirit might have once meant to some, but considering the gray area in which the current definition resides, the parallels are relative. Perhaps it is the anxious and inspired energy with which the four piece plays. The recording is a testament to this; recorded over two days in an East Vancouver garage, one gets an immediate sense of the ferocity of the performance - the drums pound and ring in a way that can only be achieved with the hardest of hits, the vocals stress and distort like they were belted through a blown PA (which, it turns out, they were). Or maybe it's the detailed yet raucous guitar work. Dan's brilliantly precise technique juxtaposes Mark's bending fuzz with unique character; the former displays an irrefutable talent while the latter tilts its hat to both Sonic Youth's earlier work and sheer bombast. The combination is absolute. This is not to say that Baby Control is necessarily a punk band; in fact, the four members might deny the connection completely. Similarly, the music itself betrays punk's three-chord race to the finish and ventures into jangly, mid-tempo pop territory, occasionally adopting a blues swagger. Always dense with discord, the guitar and vocal lines still somehow infuse themselves with hooks." (label info)