Album Review: Casual Nausea – Demons

There is a brilliant acoustic three-piece called The Tiger Lillies who have, for at least the past three decades, performed what their Wikipedia entry calls Brechtian Punk Cabaret – melancholy or angry songs from the gutter set to an often jolly fairground accordion, bass and drum accompaniment. That paradoxical musical spirit pervades Demons and while Casual Nausea are clearly – and rightly – very angry, their music is full of optimism and major chords. Like a kind of happy Crass on speed. And that’s a recommendation.

This album starts strongly (Vote) and gets better and better. As well as being a sonic battering, there are lots of changes of gear and musical diversity across the piece that underline that this is not simply minimalist crusty punk ranting. There is a huge musical intelligence at work here. The shared vocal approach gives the impression that Casual Nausea is a truly collective and democratic effort. The themes are the personal-political, dealing with the drudgery of the eat/work/sleep/repeat treadmill (Empty Rewards and standout track Zombie) and the iniquities of the system (Terminator and Corruption). Stirring and necessary stuff indeed, but don’t switch off after Built To Break because there is a delightfully quirky acoustic version of Blood In The Oil which really accentuates the song’s jaunty ska stylings.

All of this goes to show that expressing your support for progressive causes or commenting on the ills of society does not need to be a po-faced and serious affair. It can, and maybe should, be very entertaining. There is that paradoxically upbeat feel to this whole album that belies the underlying darkness of the lyrical content. This album is for you if you like your speed/streetpunk served up with verve, humour and swagger and don’t mind five mates from Ipswich who never thought they’d amount to anything shouting at you.

You can catch Casual Nausea at the Manchester Punk Festival and rumour has it, they will have copies of the album with them. Demons is released by TNSRecords on 19^th April and it can be pre-ordered here