The Welch Boys

Drinkin' Angry

Written by: PP on 29/10/2008 13:18:31

Ah, the flourishing Boston punk rock scene reveals some of its best new talent again in the form of The Welch Boys and their new album "Drinkin' Angry". They are a band that plays working man's punk rock with a whiskey drinker's attitude and a perfect sense for short but infectiously catchy gang vocal-oriented songs about issues like child abuse and drinking problems, and they do it with the same black humour mentality as NOFX.

Musically, The Welch Boys fall somewhere between a ripe group of Boston celebrities, think The Dropkick Murphys, Deadly Sins and Street Dogs. For the uninformed, that equals anthemic choruses, a raspy vocalist who sounds like he's had a few drinks too many to be performing on the album (in a good way), and an admirably simple and straightforward attitude to punk rock riffs; aside for a few mini-solos in the vein of NOFX ("My Own Creation" for instance), "Drinkin' Angry" is mostly made out of simple power chords, and like their contemporaries from Boston, the band hits a bullseye in a scene that's forgotten all about the fantastic drunken pub singalongs of the old days.

So now that we've established The Welch Boys to be ridiculously catchy, it's time to focus on the band's absolute strength: the brilliant lyricism that's simultaneously incredibly simple and pointedly complex. Lets start with the title track that's probably the best 'drown-your-sorrow-into-alcohol' song written to date: "Now you've got me drinkin' angry, gonna drink 'til I get pissed, gonna drink til your memory is faded away, gonna drink 'til you don't exist" - this delivered with cheerful raspy gang vocals from the whole band, complete with clinking of pint glasses at the end of the song. Or take the hilarious child-abuse song "Pervert", for instance, where they've hired three children around 8 years old to delicately sing "Pete Townsend is a pervert, keep him away from the children, Pete Townsend is a pervert, keep him away from the kiiiids" - the contrast between their soft voices and the band's raspy gang shout at the end of the track is an instant classic. And on an album titled "Drinkin' Angry", a song about a drunken pub fight that ends up in an ambulance is a must ("Ambulance Ride").

What I'm getting at here is that The Welch Boys are just the right kind of band you need when you're downing pints of Guinness with your friends. They're hilarious enough to make you chuckle at many of their lyrics, but at the same time pointedly critical enough to make you consider the topics they're talking about with a degree of seriousness. But most importantly, The Welch Boys remind us how great it is to have a large bunch of songs all about the huge singalongs.

8

Download: Pervert, Drinkin' Angry, My Own Creation
For the fans of: Dropkick Murphys, Deadly Sins, NOFX, Street Dogs
Listen: Myspace

Release date 24.10.2008
I Scream Records

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