Witches With DicksThis Boston, MA band certainly has an odd name, and personally I'm not huge into it but hey it's not easy picking a good name these days. Well, these guys play punk rock with pop punk sensibilities. They are influenced by Screeching Weasel, Jawbreaker, The Replacements, and The Lemonheads. Thus far they have released a split 7" with Conversions and I'm sure they have released demos and what not early on.
As mentioned in the above paragraph, these guys play a more rugged version of pop punk with vocals that are more typical to hardcore. Throughout the ten songs they keep it relatively short, most of them get over the two minute mark but none crack three minutes. It's nothing groundbreaking but it's good for what it is. I especially liked the vocals, they fit in with the music enough not to sound odd but they are more gritty than the typical pop punk outfit.
Really solid lyrics that have very witty and humourous titles and range across the typical emotions of people in their 20's. Most of the lyrics tend to deal with complacency in the norm, commonality in the punk scene, being lost and confused, etc,. Yes, it has all been done before, but not enough in this fashion.
I found it strange that there are no recording credits but oh well, maybe they recorded it themselves. Anyway, the album sounds good though the guitar sounds a little distant and thin in the mix. The bass tone is treble heavy, wasn't really into it. The drums sounded okay. The vocals were mixed in pretty good, although it seems they are a bit behind the instrumentation.
The layout is in copper with a black and white Ford molester van serving as the main illustration through out the layout. The booklet is two pages with all of the lyrics displayed in white over the copper background with the same van on each page. The back of the tray art has a diagram of a clock and it's buttons with the 10 tracks broken into step one and two. Probably the best thing about the layout is the little line in the label credits that says, All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized Duplication is Inevitable. Isn't that the truth. Anyhow, wasn't huge on the layout. Now what would've been awesome is some cartoon witches with big ole cock pieces.
Rating: 3.6/5
Songs Worthy of Replay: Fuck All Lindseys, Your Job Does Not Rock Balls and How To Cook 40 Humans
Synopsis: The songs were solid, the lyrics were by the far the best thing about this release. However, the recording and layout didn't do it for me. If you like your pop punk a little rough around the edges with vocals that don't suck ass you might want to check these guys out. Check out some of their tunes at their myspace: myspace.com/witcheswithdicks