When Lisa sent me this, she said to me that Broke reminded her of The Rabble. Now, although I am playing rapid catchup on NZ bands, that is a band I know as they were connected with Orewa College and one of my daughters even wrote and recorded a song with Chas. I saw them play a few times, and always came away incredibly impressed, so are Broke in that same melodic punk mould? The short answer to that is “hell, yeah”, this is a blast from beginning to end. It comes over as a cross between some of the better American punk with loads of British realism to create something which is fiery, fast, and a load of fun.
It kicks off with interplay between the two guitars, then the rhythm section comes in to provide more body before Aidan starts singing. They innately understand that for a song to have impact it must be way more than heads down and meet you at the end, and there is a lot going on within a song which seems way less than the 4:33 they have given themselves. The arrangement keeps coming back to the main forceful riffs, but there are different attacks on the guitar while they slow it down at one point and put the vocals through an effect, so that when they come back it has even more presence and power than it did previously. I note they are playing some gigs in different parts of the country, and I can see me heading over to Dead Witch on 17th December as if they are like this on record I can’t wait to see them live.
Rating: 8/10
