Album Review: Redd Kross, Beyond The Door

Redd Kross are back on duty, piloting their cosmic-magic-carpet-ride of sound.

We’re in safe hands – they’ve been doing it for forty years, while somehow implausibly managing to sound like the last fifty years never happened. The McDonald brothers, whose first show was opening for Black Flag and who were once label-mates with Nirvana, continue to hone and mine their low-brow fascinations – they are the curators of a forsaken popular culture and we are but tourists picnicking in the ruins.

Welcome to ‘The Party’ – that’s track one: ‘Eight Miles High’ and cruising as ‘Incense And Peppermints’ blasts from the speakers and everything’s groovy. The guitars crunch, drums bash and clatter and vocals remain refreshingly un-auto-tuned. There are no distractions from a singular ever-abiding vision. Their musical archaeology digs up surf, punk, glitter, and garage rock in a transcendent soup of hooks and riffs.

‘The Party Underground’ is a sort of manifesto, a paean to good times where the fun is 24/7, everything is a blast and nothing to bum you out. And then Buzz Osborne turns up and rips one out. A guitar solo I mean.

Finally Sparks’ camp classic, ‘When Do I Get to Sing My Way’ gets new legs, teeth and a few other body parts while stating “Traditions must go on”. Who better than Redd Kross to maintain the faith?

Out August 23.