Album Review: Crazy Arm - "Dark Hands, Thunderbolts"

Signed to Xtra Mile recordings, home of Beans On Toast and (occasionally) Frank Turner, my first expectations of Crazy Arm was as another one of those slightly folky troubadours but they're definitely a bit of a heavier proposition. Hailing from Devon, this is their fourth album with its predecessors dating back as far as 2009.

Opening song Montenegro actually reminds me a bit of '90s punks Compulsion which is no bad thing while Blessed and Cursed builds from a gentle Men They Couldn't Hang style intro to a frenetic assault before the Pogues indebted folk-punk of Brave Starts Here and the sinister Fear Up keep the momentum ticking along.

The Pogues and The Men They Couldn't Hang are definitely the two big touchstones for Crazy Arm but, similar to fellow folk-punks Ferocious Dog (and the Levellers before them), they at least sound like a band comfortable in their own skin. It's perhaps telling that they sound their best when they let their punkier instincts take over such as on Golden Hind or the excellently names And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Meds rather than the slightly more unfocused likes of Loose Lips or Demonised. But overall, there's more good here than bad even if there isn't a really killer tune just to raise this up from being a good album to an essential one.

If you're the sort of person who's not much of a fan of this genre to begin with then I can't see Crazy Arm being the band to change your mind but if you do like the Pogues, the Levellers et al then you might just find plenty to enjoy here.


NITE SONGS RATING: 🌔🌔🌔🌔🌔🌔🌔🌑🌑🌑 (7/10)

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