Bright Lights & Dead Beats – DISGRACELand (self released)

It’s hard to translate a live band to tape/hard drive, but DISGRACE Land have given it a damned good shot on their sophomore CD “Bright Lights & Dead Beats”. In doing so, they’ve also wound the clock back to Sydney circa 1986 when the city resonated with the sounds of the garage and the swamp in equally large measures.

“Bright Lights…” is a major sonic advance on “A Beginners Guide to DISGRACEland” and that’s largely down to engineer, mixer and masterer John Cobbin, but the band gave him the songs and performances to make it fly.

It’s a no-frills recording but the energy is palpable on songs like the surging “Sweet Salvation”, brooding opener “Border Town” and the urgent and lean “Better Call Saul”. Granted, you don’t get frontman Carl Musker jumping on top of your stereo to preach at you in person but listening to the CD is the next best thing.

In many ways, DISGRACELand are a relic. They are a reminder that their backyard of Sydney’s Northern Beaches was once a hotbed of sweaty, old school punk and rock and roll, a place that gave as good as it got as far as live music was concerned. For every national touring act that swept through its beer barns, a fresh crop of like-minded locals would stumble into the salty air from garages and surf clubs in response.

DISCGRACELand’s membership comes from some of those local bands that grew up in the ‘80s and their sound is true to the era’s loud and fast tradition. Nothing is auto-tuned (sometimes keeping in tune live poses a challenge) or contrived. You get 11 songs on this CD and none of them sound like Taylor Swift. Phew!     

These are songs about seedy streets and seamier characters, and their dark stories populate “Bright Lights & Dead Beats” like half-tanked clubbies in the front bar of the Harbord Hilton on a Friday night. 

The tremolo laden “No-One Gets Out Alive” crosses The Cramps with a Made in Detroit guitar sound and an ominous chorus. “Long Haul Interstate Truck Driving Man” comes on like early Beasts of Bourbon without the ramshackle country feel.

Whether by design or accident, it’s the notes that bassist James Romain leaves out that put the air under the country stomp “Cold Hearted Man”.    

The stripped-back garage punk sound of opener “Border Town” is crossed with something more exotic and slightly Tex Mex on “Miss Behaviour”.  “15 Years” swings like a dunny door in the wind while “(I Don’t Wanna Go To the) Euro Disco” takes its lead from the Celibate Rifles.

Bandcamp Consumer Warning: There are a few Disgracelands out there so pick the one that spells its name DISCGRACEland. Or do it the easy way and click here.