Self-released, 6 November 2020
The Thorazines throw together a few chords and a couple of catchy tunes.
Melbourne’s The Thorazines play Ramones worshipping punk rock with some big reverb-heavy drums and lots of call-and-response vocals (that even come across almost Rancid-like at times). They aren’t the most traditional amongst the Ramonescore crowd, but their songs are pretty catchy and full of energy. And I Wonder What’s Killing Me Now? is another good offering and follow up to July’s Can’t Wait For Yesterday.
The originals on I Wonder are pretty good, loaded with hooks and only marginally slight. “Braindead” is my favorite. It’s fast shouty Ramonescore with some rapidfire vocal delivery (a little raspy and raw, but melodic and sticky) and a cool catchy call-and-response chorus. And the bridge has a real nice lead guitar. This fun start is followed by two more originals. The sort of heavy and powerful “Now That You’ve Gone Away” is pretty good, playing around with some okay hooks and melodies and another strong bridge. The third original, “Harley Has The Hiccups”, feels a little tossed off and slight. The lead guitar that opens the song is great, but the rest of the song is just sort of decent to my ears. Nothing bad, just not my favorite moment on here.
On I Wonder, The Thorazines also pull off a couple of covers, and they do them pretty well. They take on the great 30 Amp Fuse song “Sorry?” and do it well, keeping the pace up and driving the melodies into my brain. I really like it. The other cover is a Social Distortion song. They do plenty of justice to Mommy’s Little Monster’s “Another State Of Mind”, hitting the melody and pulling vocals that even sound a tad like Mike Ness. Just like the original, The Thorazines take drives and kicks up a raucous racket. There’s real power on this one and some nice lead guitar, too.
I Wonder What’s Killing Me Now? is a cool chunk of The Thorazines growing catalog. The band certainly know their way around a good hook and play with some real power that keeps everything driving and pacey throughout. It’s pretty good stuff.
Favorite song: “Braindead”
Favorite moment: the sticky call-and-response chorus on “Braindead”
Favorite whatever else: the Boogada-inspired album art is pretty fantastic
ryan is a reviewer and news editor for TGEFM. He’s very secretive, he might be an alien.
