Some Girls is something of a hardcore supergroup comprised of Wes Eisold (
Give Up the Ghost,
American Nightmare), Rob Moran (
Unbroken,
Over My Dead Body), and Justin Pearson (Locust, Swing Kids,
Holy Molar). As the album title suggests, though, these guys have musical concerns that go a bit beyond the typical louder-faster-shorter mindset. Make no mistake, these songs are plenty loud and fast and short, but the band's ferocious sound is leavened by occasionally interesting guitar textures and an unusual tag-team vocal approach that harks back to 1980s hip-hop in spirit and evokes other, equally unlikely influences as well -- or am I the only one who hears echoes of early
XTC in "Sex and Glue" (and maybe even in the brilliant "Rains")?
All My Friends Are Going Death includes material from the band's previous EPs (Rains and Blues) as well as a handful of new recordings and some demo material annoyingly hidden at the end of the program behind 50-some-odd empty 12-second tracks. Recommended. ~ Rick Anderson