If great art comes from great pain, then The Palpitations step forward as storytellers of a new apocalyptic rock Renaissance.
They’ve frescoed the ceiling in intricate imagery, all of it black as a dystopian disco of eviscerating rhythms tear through the trauma in primal lead track My Carnivore.
Oh, the horror of it all! Which is all part of the cinematic appeal, as Hitchcockian dread-flick movie motifs of quarantine in a crumbling world, add a sinister prophetism to angular anthem, Lights Out.
But there’s fact to counter the fiction, as true tales from the hospital frontline of the Palpitations’ doctor duo, expose the tragic ravages of grief and drug addiction on Siren.
Clap yourself impressed, for this is a bold debut that – complete with a secret spoken word track – serves as a vignette for troubled times we will never forget.
8/10
Review originally featured in Vandalism Begins at Home fanzine
