The Fun Die Young e.p. – The Fun Die Young

Unintentional though it must be, two odd references immediately spring to mind when I play Void You. The first the “far away” gang vocal on the chorus is pure Pogues (Sally MacLennane to be precise) and the second is that singer Ash sounds just like the main man from the Maccabees. No not the one-time darlings of the lndie press with nice hair and dead behind the eye stares, the other older, scuzzy punk-folk band from, ironically, the same neck of the woods. Coincidental as it all may be it was enough convince me that the Gods of punk are telling me that this was a band to investigate.

All that aside, whilst The Fun Die Young cite all the right references, Blinking Park 182, Rise Against The Machine and all of that sort of malarkey, what they have created here is not only much more interesting but for a genre usually wrapped up in rules and regulations, traditions and uniform, moments of musical genius. Opener, Real Life manages to take tried and tested punk sounds and injects them with dark, Doorsian breakdowns and sparse industrial bleakness.

And if Class of 2013 panders to their stateside influences, all gung-ho teen anthem and fist in the air choruses, Self-Abomination sounds like the post-punk experimentation from back in the day as bands rejected the punk movement and splintered off into dozens of new movements. Again it is the dark dynamics, the peaks and troughs, light and shade, power and restraint that shapes this song and that for me is their selling point as a band. They may be happy to ape the punk icons and rock gods that make up their record collections, but for me, they are more original than they give themselves credit for.