The Pizzas - Bad Ass Youth

Of all the singles that have passed through my front door this first six months of the year (and there’s a lot of quality releases piled in the basement bar right now), I going to have to suck it up and declare the Pizzas Bad Ass Youth 7” as the incendiary go-to record so far. If you were to tell me this when I took a shot on them, particularly because of the Daggerman Records imprint, I would have laughed out loud, cause with a name like the Pizzas I’m not entirely sold on the notion that this is anything but frivolous slop-punk. Set to 45, you’d only be half-right. I mean, c’mon, look at the cover; it’s got enough tongue-in-cheek signifiers to warrant the claim I’m staring down a novelty band. These guys do play in a bevy of other outfits, making the Pizzas a part-time thang. But I beg this band to please put more time in, imagine how far you’d fly if put all the efforts into one blood-basket. After all, this is purely frivolous but-tight-punk – the guitars busted wide open, the velocity at dangerous levels, the feedback its own instrument. The catch here is catchiness, youth exhalations and pop exhaustion found plentiful in “Hideous Fashion” a b-side anthem that ratchets up the melody when the song reaches its saturation point. Abandon all serious discussion and ah revive the pogo will you? An album of this hyperkinetic brash pop might be too much to ask for.