EPITAPH RECORDS 8th May 2026
This is a great big chunk of fun. Usually described as Punk, this is better understood as big ol’ scuzzy rock and roll. Short and filthy guitar solos, fuzzy power-chords, anthemic choruses, feedback and street-wise topics. If you like Jesse Malin, Wildhearts, Pearl Jam, or just loud and grubby rock, you’ll love this. The titles alone tip you off: ‘Born To Kill’, ‘No Way Out’, ‘Never Going Back Again’; this is all about pushing against the pricks that hold you down – or pounding a fist in the air at a gig – angry, rocking and cathartic.
There’s time for some love songs in there and even a novelty cover of Chris Isaac’s ‘Wicked Game’. ‘Crazy Dreamer’ is a loose stepping country thumper, with the sort of delivery Neil Young’s Crazy Horse brought to songs like ‘Farmer John’. Lucinda Williams adds her inimitable voice to the song. The album belts along at speed, surrounded by a sea of guitar that belies the band being a four-piece. Mike Ness writes all the lyrics and they bundle up the classic rock and roll tropes – losers with regret rising up and struggling through, celebrating defeat and victory, looking back at life with a sense of triumphal survival, joy, sticking a finger up to the world. It’s as permanently teenaged in attitude and gnarled in experience as quality rock should be. Nothing fancy, just a blart of noise and attitude.
With fifteen years since the last album, this could easily have been a slightly sad reflection of past glories, for fans only, yet somehow it carries the torch without a blink or misstep. Starting out in 1978 in California, it’s been on and off for the band, with a hiatus while Ness spent some prison time and cleaned himself up. The Nineties were the peak period of success for the band, then more breaks and reformations, Mike being the only constant. Following a dose of tonsil cancer, it’s great to hear him and the current band doing what they do best, including the by now traditional novelty cover version that they do so well. A rough-edged, bashy yet sweet cover of ‘Wicked Game’ is exactly the treat you’d imagine it would be.
In his early sixties, Mike Ness and Social Distortion are a vital force, pushing hard on the joys of loud guitars, drums, fuzz and yellable choruses.
Ross McGibbon