[rating=3.00]
Ahh the elder Punk…what becomes of him or her? Most 12 years old slam-dancers want to grow up to be Mike Ness but that can’t be everyone’s path. You can keep on the Hey Ho Let’s Go! route until you die like godfathers The Ramones, or you could find yourself in some sort of mid tempo vortex of middling hell ala The Scenics with Dead Man Walks Down Bayview.Â
There is no punk left in these supposed punk rock survivors from Toronto. After recording an album titled Underneath The Door in 1979 and gaining some success in Canada they broke up, just recently reuniting for this collection of mild tunes. Opener “Cold Cave” sounds as if it was a simple high tempo run that got the life sucked out of it by years of stagnation. The possibly ironic “When You Come Around” mixes Jesus into things, but the meaning gets mumbled and lost along the way; it really isn’t worth going back around to find out why.
“No Sleep” wants to be rockabilly badly but there is zero energy encased in this track as things come close to falling apart in a bad way multiple times via that guitar solo. “Growing Pains” got it half right as vocally the song hurts and musically it isn’t much better with a guitar break that is just broken all over, continuing that way for 7+ minutes. Sure they want to be Television or The Velvet Underground but when things don’t work on those levels they sound awful awfully quick.
You can’t fault a group of old guys getting together to relive and revive their fleeting glorious moments, but perhaps a vanity project to friends or random live reunions would suit them better then this collection of odd, off putting and jumbled songs. Let a Dead Man Walks Down Bayview pass you by.   Â
