Album Review: Chubby & The Gang - "The Mutt's Nuts"

 

We first encountered Sahf London scuzz-punks Chubby & The Gang via their debut album Speed Kills last year. An intriguingly odd beast, it was 80% full throttle thrash-punk with the odd unexpected more reflective slow number. Although it didn't quite mesh together as comfortably as it might've, there were enough promising signs there that with time, this lot could be on to something.

I'm pleased to report that with this second album, the group have honed their sound well and it represents good progress. Although the opening one-two of the title track and It's Me Who'll Pay see them attacking your eardrums with all the subtlety of a brick to the face, the chugging riff of Coming Up Tough and the more poppy melodies (including handclaps!) of On The Meter show a band who aren't willing to let their sound box them in and all power to them.

In fact, the thrash-punk that was the main force of Chubby & The Gang's debut seems to have been relegated to a background thing on The Mutt's Nuts (although it still resurfaces with a vengeance on the likes of the furious Pressure, Overachiever and Getting Beat Again) and it shows that this is a band really spreading their wings in terms of the diversity of their sound ranging from gentle stripped-back laments (Take Me Home To London, I Hate The Radio) through lurching scuzzed-up blues rock (White Rags), rockabilly (Life On The Bayou) and even doo-wop (Life's Lemons).

Similar to the Amyl & The Sniffers album we reviewed a month or so back, The Mutt's Nuts does what every good second album would do in that it builds on the best bits of its predecessor and introduces some new tricks and variety without straying too far from what drew people to the band in the first place. A very impressive effort.

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