New York – I’ve found my new favorite album of spring. Memphis punk band Ex-Cult just released Midnight Passenger, the follow-up to their 2012 self-titled debut. Full of crunchy, fuzzy, garage punk goodness, this sophomore record is a right crawl through nighttime scenarios and satiating debauchery in the darkest dive bars dripping with psychedelic slime. In other words, the whole thing is one big hell yeah.
Album opener “Shattered Circle” is immediately like a call to arms; maybe to slam dance, but also as a social critique. As adrenalizing as this album is, it’s also full of metaphors and commentary, as a good punk album should be. Tell me about the game I can’t win in my shattered circle, but then follow it up with a guttural “Ugh” for emphasis. Frontman Chris Shaw puts all the gusto he has behind it, with such intensity that it’s really hard to disagree with his rhythmically bursting lyrics.
Second track “Ties You Up” is the album version of Ex-Cult’s Record Store Day single, which was recorded in L.A. with Ty Segall at his home studio “the sweat lodge.” That version featured Zumi Rosow of the K-Holes on Saxophone, and was limited to 800 copies. This album version is still pretty sweet, with it’s galloping bass and darting guitar spikes.
Title track “Midnight Passenger” we featured on Mixtape 52, when it came out as the lead single off the then forthcoming album, and touted as an ode to the band’s time spent on the road. This jam does a great job capturing the feeling of late night debauchery in it’s purest, most alive form. “I’m the voice from the sewer” Chris Shaw iterates, “I’ll come back when it’s time / make the dead come alive.” This is exactly how I imagine a Ex-Cult live show. It’s not a threat, it’s more of a fact, and it feels like this song is the embodiment of the driving force of life. If this song had come out back when 1985 zombies vs. punk filmReturn of the Living Dead was made, this would have been on the soundtrack for sure.
The production of this album, and the way the tracks flow together is like they recorded the whole thing live in one take, and just split the songs into tracks for the LP. The lingering feedback in between ties all the songs together, sounding like a cohesive story that is being told a certain way, in this order, for a reason. When we slide right into “Confusion Hill,” it quickly becomes clear that you are now in the rabbit hole. Feel the sound swell up around you and dig in. The repetition and droning of this instrumental track really makes it sink in deep, almost like a meditation.
“Catholic Entries” is the arc of the album, right in the middle, and also when a random space ship synth spike sneaks it’s way in and beams back out just as fast. Now the new revelation is “Found a future of nothing,” and the reverb soaks like clouds of smoke, to resonate the message further, and begins to feel like the turning point of the album. The surface of the inspiration forMidnight Passenger has been scratched, and we’re now beginning to come to terms with the fact they we may never make it out of the rabbit hole. But maybe we don’t need to, because it’s actually just a mirror of the outside anyway. The rest of the album tumbles on like a wave rolling rapidly, careening around all the things that go bump in the night and riding on that feedback all the way to finale track “Lights Out Club.” That title alone sounds like a fitting “end,” to this record of multiple layers of meanings, and textures of sounds. “There’s only one place that I go / to Lights Out Club” Shaw shouts, while that one guitar solo wilds out, and then both guitars go into a droning duel, propelled by the bass and drum hits, descending into a stormy dirge of noise. Then strikes like lightning, with that voice from the sewer again, telling you to drink some more, before it all ends in a quickly swooning, blurry blackout. Ex-Cult has made a record here that is a mighty visceral ride all the way till the end, a great rock till you drop.
Midnight Passenger is out now on Goner Records. Keep up with Ex-Cult by liking their facebook page.
