CD Review: Buick Six – Common Arms EP

buick six   Review: Lana Harris

Despite the never-ending death and birth cycle of live venues, amid licensing restrictions and noise curfews, bedrooms and garages on both sides of the Brisbane river continue to deliver quality acts to the Australian music scene. Buick Six owe their beginnings to the soggy grounds of 2007’s Splendour in the Grass festival. By 2008, a debut EP had appeared which captured the force of Buick Six’s Brisbane based gigging through live recording.

Their new EP, Common Arms, is garage rock at its dirty, window shaking best. It is only their second release, but the songs on the record sound like the outpourings of a band well used to working and recording together. Guitar work throughout is excellent. The overall feel of the record is urgent, potent, bursting – an achievement to capture on a recording, and suggesting that when viewed live, Buick Six would be a sonic explosion of grinding, grungy rock. The simple bass-guitar-drums line up works in their favour, a pure outlet for their untamed energy left uncomplicated by extra musicians or fussy elements.

Opening track ‘Changes’ has stoner rock elements, with slow drawn out riffs settled amidst tight drumming and a longish guitar solo. ‘She Ain’t Right’ brings speed to the table, ending in a rock out frenzy that lends itself to head banging air guitar, whilst ‘Velvet Claps’ shows off a bit of double vocals and is (slightly) mellower than its EP mates. ‘Super High’ rounds out the EP by resuming the assault pace for a track that shares similarities with the recordings on Kyuss’ first album Wretch, when the stoner rockers were still pumping out raw and energetic tracks, before giving way to their trademark laid back style on later releases.

Common Arms points to Buick Six having a promising future: the music grabs your guts with its greasy hands; leaving behind sticky riff prints and gritty shards of satisfaction that last long after the final chords have died away.

related:
Buick SixBuick Six at iTunes

Buick Six website

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