Label: Moonlee Records
Release date: July 3, 2020
Production: Luka Cerar
EP length: 12.55 min
Genre: Noise Rock
Rating: 8.5/10
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A while back, Nikki Louder’s hustle and hard work firmly anchored them among the leading names of the new wave of younger-generation alternative rock bands, playing in those sprawling underground halls historically nurtured by the richness of Slovenia’s underground rock culture. These daring Kamnik noise rock lads are slowly growing into grown men, but they’re nowhere near short on high-octane fuel in their tanks or on confessional abrasion. Their EP »s/t« (short for self-titled) keeps all of that in abundance, and Nikki Louder can export it in any quantity they like.
A break. A few years long, which got involuntarily (out of necessity) stretched even further. We know why. So the release of the EP »s/t« lands like a “sedative” ordered up for all the followers of three unbridled garage hellraisers, who are once again bursting at the seams with hyper-explosive “aesthetics,” loose sonic jaggedness and mischief. In times like these, the self-titled EP is an even more intense cry of affirmation from the band: “Yes. We’re here!” Or better yet, re-affirmation: “We’re still here!”, or even: “We’re back!” It’s also a real prelude to the band’s next artistic step, the creation of a new full-length studio effort. With the EP »s/t«, the trio confirms that the chemistry of sharp-witted rudimentary punch, honest instincts, sensuality and heartfelt toughness hasn’t left them. The trio also keeps up a rich fantasy in its surrealist lyrics, which, through screeching, frenetic vocals, reach a special fatal magnetism alongside the destructive kinetics of the phrasing and rhythms.
On the new release, Nikki Louder dig more intensely into some rhythmic structures that are new for them, shaking up their recognizable sonic and stylistic character. There’s more modulation and gluing together of different motifs, highlighted by the six-minute closer I Think Not, where, thanks to its jam-style insistence on motivic structures, the track can also come across as a kind of hypnotic mantra, even flirting with elements of post-noise. Huh, what kind of coinage is that now? This song is the definite peak of the new EP, also in terms of a higher dose of experimentation, which still holds on to all the essential elements of this band’s self-made, uncompromising purism.
»s/t« keeps that proverbially cute, warped wall of sonic noise, the biting, snappy sonic terror dictated, held back and nurtured, in an unbridled garage-hardened assault, by the avalanche-like noise racket of this “cocky” Kamnik trio! The machine of unstoppable sonic grinding and humming terrorizing is back. At full tilt and full swing. In the unstoppable rush of euphoria from surplus adrenaline and testosterone, three bouncing stallions.
Nikki Louder are also announcing a special launch show for August 25, 2020, planned on the stage of the summer garden of Gala Hala in Ljubljana (Metelkova mesto).
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Tracklist:
!. Sip And Again
2. Tail Droop When Girls Leave
3. I Think Not
Lineup:
Blaž Sever – vocals, guitar
Petar Cerar – bass guitar
Luka Cerar – drums
