OPEN THE BLAST DOORS - Mazinga (self released)
Mazinga approach their work like a bunch of hoodlums in a backyard mechanic's shop re-birthing a stolen car. They grimly strip everything back, drop in a re-tooled 475 Chevy Stroker, jack up the back end and launch out onto the streets, spouting fumes everywhere.
Mazinga are named after a Japanese robot and marry a love of anime and sci-fi to punk rock. Three of the crew are old schoolmates who played in bands on the below-the-radar scene in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Guitarist Chris "Box" Taylor has the most prominent profile, playing bass for Scott Morgan's soulful rockers, Powertrane.
It's a rumbling, cantankerous noise that Mazinga makes over these five songs, all downstroke, thunderous bottom end and twisted lead breaks. It's been a long time between drinks with the band going on hiatus for five years after losing a drummer, but with Powertrane's well-pedigreed Alex King now keeping time they're back up and running and sounding better than ever.
"Blast Doors" is a significant aural advance on their album with Kevin Sharpe's production giving bite to Taylor's no-nonsense fret attack. This configuration is one guitar down but that doesn't detract in any way. Additionally, King and bassist Big Tony O'Farrell get a good look-in in this mix and lay down a formidable bedrock. Which, as anyone knows, is where it all starts.
The cosmic rock trip that Mazinga loves to take is shown to best effect on "Thourium Orbiter 200", reprising a song from their self-titled 1999 album. There's a wig-out guitar outro that'll fry your speakers. If you can imagine a Hawkwind song trimmed back to less than three minutes, you'll know where it's coming from. The title track lays it out pretty well too with a clattering rhythm and scuzzy guitar payload.
Pushed for a fave about which to rave, however, I'd shoot for "Blonde Zombies". It might sound like Mazinga's idling at the traffic lights rather than burning rubber down the highway here but there's an irresistible feel in place and Marc McFinn's vocal wraps itself around the hard-arsed melody line perfectly.
Grab this direct from the band. The only question left to ask is: When's the next album guys? -
The Barman
1/4
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MAZINGA
- Mazinga (Reanimator Records)
Chris "Box" Taylor , bass player from Scott Morgan's Powertrane, thrust a copy
of this CD by his other band in my hand on a visit to Ann Arbor recently. It
took a while to hit the CD player properly, post-trip, but it was worth
the wait.
Mazinga have been slogging it out on the Michigan rock and roll merry-go-round
since the mid-'90s, delivering what they term Maximum Cosmic Punk. Scrape away
the anime artwork and the sci-fi references inherent in that branding and you'll
find a band with a heartful of punk soul and an armoury packed with guitar.
Plus, a goodly sense of humour.
Mazinga - the name comes from the robot hero of a Jap sci-fi movie - might wear the punk tag but their music is broader in scope, encompassing surf, garage and psych. "Gravity" is a case-in-point, propelled by Don Blum's driving polyrhythms and some solid intertwined surf and fuzz guitarwork from Box Taylor and Denzil Gray. (Box cedes the bass job to Tony O'Farrell in this band). Marc McFinn handles vocals and manages to keep pace with the varied nature of some of the material. Variety's a by-word - there's even a smell of hay to the country-punk shuffle of the closer, "No Reward".
Some other great tunes here, too. "Had Enough" is a breakneck break-up song full of nervous punk-ish energy, thanks in no small part to Blum's terrific drumming and McFinn's vocals. I'm guessing "Namorita" is probably an ode to a comic book heroine (artwork impressario Big Tony is a fan of the genre) and is as is catchy as hell. "One Rude Easter Bunny" manages to marry high-speed Dictators-style sounds with hilarious lyrics in an ode to a girlfriend behind bars.
"Only 15" is another flat-out foot-stomper, this time about jailbait, clocking in at just over a minute and it's bizarre what some songs do to you. (This one has just the slightest echo of the Human League's "Don't You Want Me Baby" in one of the lines - which says more about annoyances lodged in my damaged memory banks than "Only 15". Thank god she's not a year older or - shudder - Dr Hook might have sprung to mind). "Satana" is another song worth sitting up and taking notice of. (None of the tunes herein are replicated on the split E.P. with Swedes Sex Sex Sex, which you'll find reviewed in the Singles Bar, in case you were wondering).
You have to give credit to a band that covers "Mongoloid" (surely Devo's best tune, pre-commercial success, and the spiffiest cover of that band since the Celibate Rifles put the knife through "Girl U Want" at a Sydney show a few years ago). I'm in the dark about some of the movie samples that bob in and out of the mix (I'm a "Godzilla vs Mothra" fan myself), but it's a solid-sounding production effort and the engine room and guitars up front.
Well worth chasing down if you feel like dropping
the band a line and negotiating a price. -
The Barman
3/4
