THIRD MAN RECORDS 3rd September 2025
How can it be two years since Snooper’s first album? And that chaotically happy collapsing punky gig? I’m so pleased to have more of the fun, even if it’s as short and sharp as the last. Cramming a dozen songs into half an hour, it simply demands a replay.
The longest song here is the closer, at four minutes and the pacing, measured bass and well-judged effects show this band can play longer stuff – but they don’t want to. With a one or two minute song, everything is impulsive, everything is energy. The dead weight is trimmed off and what remains is the skeletal speedcar of Snooper in motion. Dip into their cover of The Beatles’ ‘Come Together’ to see what the Snooper effect does. Running fast and faster, the instrumentation is post-punk in its bones but pure garage punk in its spirit.
Snooper are on Jack White’s Third Man records and he knows his basics, appreciating raw and dirty expression. For comparison, I’m naming Leeds’ Cowtown again, just because they deserve to be megastars and The Lovely Eggs for their reinvention of punk spirit in gonzo psych-tinged punk. But Snooper are faster and shorter – full of gasps, yelps, random sounds and screeching sudden halts.
The brainchild of Blair Tramel and Connor Cummins during lockdown, the band were a recording project and the insane live show came later. Here, the live show has fed creative spirit into the recording process, making this offering even more bonkers than the last. Please please, let’s have another UK tour.
An album for people with ants in their pants.
Ross McGibbon
Here’s what we thought of Snooper’s debut album