CD: The Menzingers - Hello Exile

★★★★ THE MENZINGERS - HELLO EXILE Pennsylvania punks channel ageing disgracefully into grown-up punk rock

Pennsylvania punks channel ageing disgracefully into grown-up punk rock

Punk rock, more so than any other genre, comes with a built-in age limit. There’s only so long you can play weeknights at basement venues for a share of the door and travel expenses; only so many years your back can withstand so many nights on strangers’ sofas. Those that don’t age out, sell out: their youthful excesses repackaged to shill hatchbacks and low-fat spread.

Gazelle Twin, Mirth, Marvel and Maud review - sardonic folk

Gorgeously anarchic music that preaches to the converted

Elizabeth Bernholz, known on stage as Gazelle Twin, comes straight from a line of musical visionaries  rebels and misfits whose influences fleet through her songs like will-o’-the-wisps. Here is the formal, clever ennui of The Stranglers, the wild, cathartic howls of Pink Floyd’s anti-establishmentarianism, and the unearthly arcs of Kate Bush’s otherworldly electro-folk.

Edwyn Collins, Concorde 2, Brighton review - enjoyable evening of tight guitar pop

The Orange Juice frontman stays mostly seated but delivers a rousing, dynamic gig

In March of this year Edwyn Collins released his ninth studio album, Badbea, his fourth since two life-altering cerebral haemorrhages derailed him in 2005. It’s a vivacious collection that runs the gamut of what guitar pop can be, from acoustic strumming to psychedelic riffing to lo-fi punkin’, all catchy as burrs. His set is peppered with it.

CD: Iggy Pop - FREE

★★★★ IGGY POP - FREE Contemplating life and mortality in an often tuneful, jazz-flecked set

Iggy affectingly contemplates life and mortality in an often tuneful, jazz-flecked set

It’s half a century since Iggy shrieked that it was “No Fun”, that it was “1969, OK”, that he wanted to be your dog. His original Stooges and his storied cohorts David Bowie and Lou Reed are all no longer with us. The Ig is the last man standing and he knows it. 72 years old, he’s the lizard-punk shaman figurehead who, off-stage, is a considered literate gent, the radio presenter with the velvet croak. His new album acknowledges that he’s now an old dude.

CD: Ezra Furman - Twelve Nudes

★★★ EZRA FURMAN - TWELVE NUDES Maverick sells short by adopting restrictive punk slant

American maverick sells himself short by adopting a restrictive punk slant

“This is our punk record,” says Ezra Furman of Twelve Nudes in its PR bumpf. In practice, the punk slant is manifested through distorted guitars, hell-for-leather tempi and howling vocals. The edgiest moment is the 55-second “Blown”, a close relative of the early Cloud Nothings and Swell Maps as they grappled with the then-current music zeitgeist.

CD: Grenades - Primate

Debut from UK punk outfit shows black wit and sonic imagination

South-coast four piece Grenades’ debut album is that most unlikely of musical outings, an ecological grunge-punk concept album. This is no wafty, feel-good affair, though, its environmental concern is akin to the eco-parable shock tactics of rough’n’ready Eighties exploitation flicks such as Cannibal Holocaust and Green Inferno.

Reissue CDs Weekly: 1977 The Year Punk Broke, Optimism / Reject

Box-set reportage on the malleable world of Brit-punk and what came next

Britain’s musical eruption of 1977 wasn’t just about the now. As the new box set 1977 – The Year Punk Broke amply demonstrates, the flux allowed more than first-timers through the door. Seasoned gig-circuit regulars Stranglers got a leg up. A band called The Rings, featuring former Pink Fairies, Pretty Things and Tomorrow member Twink, issued their one single in 1977.

CD: Violent Femmes - Hotel Last Resort

Mixed bag from US punk veterans on second post-comeback album

Violent Femmes might be one of America’s most distinctive-sounding bands. There’s no mistaking the combination of Gordon Gano’s laconic, speak-sung vocals and Brian Ritchie’s bass that has been at the heart of the band since the early 80s. On Hotel Last Resort, the band’s 10th album (and second since their 2013 comeback), they play with many sounds: comic slacker rock, blunted bossa nova, high-profile guest spot showcase, deadbeat lullaby, demented barbershop.