ninehertz

Imagine being part of Snack Family, what would it do to your mental health?

Part Beefheartian weird skronk out-blues, part bizarro sideshow attraction, its brass-led and dirty sound is a thing to behold. You can almost imagine the Tex Avery-esque cartoon wolf on the cover is the lead singer in some forgotten short from the silent cinema, with Snack Family providing the live soundtrack in a sawdust-floored dive cinema.

A shift down in gears for No Reason means it's like a Bad Seeds track in sticky, slimy slow motion. The brass sticks out here, heavily dubbed to sound as creepy as the vocals, which tell a sad tale of nuptials gone grisly. It's again an easy comparison to make, but Tom Waits' darker material has a bearing here, the same industrial and bleak sounds impacting again and again.

Back up to party speed, the proto-ska style of Pokie Eye Poke Ya has the ramshackle energy of a closed-door Speakeasy party, the room literally shaking with zoot suit-clad rude boys and girls in cocktail dresses going ape.

Once again, Snack Family have created an unnerving release, but one that shows you weird is far from dead, it's pulsing with a raging beat.