Album Review: Hammerhands – Model Citizen (Self Released)

Sitting somewhere between the crushing heaviness of doom, the desert groove of stoner rock and the bleak and unruly fuzz-drenched strut of noise-rock, Hammerhands’ new album ‘Model Citizen’ is perilously unrelenting. Their technically composite and monolithic sound has garnered some excellent support in past and has also seen them perform alongside the likes of Sons of Otis, Telekinetic Yeti, King Buffalo and the Great Sabatini. Traversing a range of tonalities, tempos, and raw soundscapes, it’s easy to draw comparison to some of the heavier elements, but there’s also more than a bit of Oxbow/Swans/Jesus Lizard in there too.

Their new album ‘Model Citizen’ is coming out on the 19th July 2019.

A messed up combination of different noises, Model Citizen is an album that has the ability to excite, intrigue and disturb. All by Hammerhands command of their instruments, making them jump, contort and dance to their every whim.

From the opening industrial style noise/fizzy stoner groove of Pleasure Island to the darkness covered catchy post-like mellowness of Too Many Rivers to the epic noise of Bastard Jesus, Model Citizen is an album that batters away.

At first there is a little bit of a nagging worry that it all might be too much. Too many different elements smushed together turning coherence into unlistenable paste but those worries are quickly put to be bed. It doesn’t take long for Hammerhands to convert even the most ardent of naysayers to their side. After all, when you’ve got tracks like the fuzzed out groove of MAXIMUM Beta and the filth of Dad Sludge pouring down, you kind of have no choice.

It’s a good one.

Hammerhands – Model Citizen Full Track Listing:

1. Pleasure Island
2. MAXIMUM Beta
3. Do It Right
4. I’m Not Here
5. Too Many Rivers
6. Dad Sludge
7. That Awful Sound
8. Not in the Cards
9. Bastard Jesus

Links

Bandcamp | Facebook