Record Review: The Vinyl Stitches

THE VINYL STITCHES
All Strapped Up
Death Pop LP / ITunes download
www.thevinylstitches.com

At last I finally get to hear the primal outpourings of London’s threesome fuzz heroes The Vinyl Stitches, four years after I first saw them. I’m happy to report that you’re gonna have a real good time kicking back with this black slab on the stereo. It kicks off with a guttural instro guitar workout that Link Wray would’ve been proud to call his own. Then the title track introduces mainman Claude Pelletier’s deep voice, and man he sounds pissed off! These songs don’t hang around: they come with a message of hate. Some woman (women?) have definitely got his goat, and now he’s kicking back. The formula here is pretty straight-forward (some may say repetitive) but this sort of rock’n’roll sneers ‘primitive, yeah that’s how we live’. The guitar sound captured here is fabulous, a good guitar band always sound better with the right fuzz tones. The chugging soars majestically above the rhythm bashing, heading into riff heaven on every track..

“Do you feel the ache in my bones”? Ask Pelletier on ‘I Know Why’, and of course I think ‘yes I do! You sound like the most pissed off man to ever emerge from the garage!’ Side one is rounded off with Back From The Grave classic ‘Can’t Tame Me’ by The Benders. It’s done with enough healthy disrespect for the original for the band to call it their own song almost. The second side is more of the same, a highlight being ‘Nothing To Lose’, a song sounding even more heavy than it's compadres (and I didn’t think that was possible here). The whole caboodle finishes with a low-down punk version of early Doors number ‘Been Down So Long’ - and it just encapsulates everything that is so-wrong-its-right with the Stitches. This album is over far too soon: I’m immediately left wanting more grade-A desperate rock’n’roll. Let’s hope album number two comes along soon! In the meantime garage-punk fans all over the world will lap this album up, and deservedly so.

PHIL ISTINE