Grade 2 – Grade 2

The first time I heard Grade 2, it was like being witness to a musical zeitgeist, the moment when you know your hearing something that’s new fresh and impactful, but has everything that’s come before in mind.  This latest album is definitely the culmination of all that they have done, so self titling it as Grade 2, is by definition saying “this is us and this what we do, there’s no need for dressing it up in any other way”. You feel that with this album they have reached a point in their career where a bunch of 15 songs has now fully captured exactly what they are and have been, as well as moving forward still.

As a band who are the antithesis of what guitar bands should be, Grade 2’s three piece bass, guitar, drum line up is just sublimely brilliant in its use of the basic tools to give a sound that hits you like a baseball bat around the knees, all three instruments are balanced just perfectly within each song, ‘Judgement Day’ for example kicks straight in with a booming bass line which os backed up by a beat that drills home the narrative of this is the start of an album which will judge all those who fucked over the population in past years and more.  ‘Under The Streetlight’ is a song that comes in early on and gives you a hint of who is behind this bands journey, yes the enigmatic Tim Armstrong, a definite nod to Rancid in it style and power.

The whole of this album is just packed full of tunes that either strip your head of the shit that’s going on in the world by giving you something to shout along with, ‘Doesn’t Matter Much Now’ and ‘Don’t Stand Alone’ being in this vein, the latter being the stand out anthem in an album full of them.

Yet within all the angst angst and rebellion, you will still find gems of compassion and love for the youth they sing for, ‘Brassic’ is a song that cuts like a razor to the skin when it says “I got nothing to spend and nothing to do” is something so many will get, but it also feels like a song that somehow still drives home standing together in adversity with the line “I’m brassic with you” from the depths of a desperate song you still somehow feel not forgotten, then there is ‘Celine’ a song that lifts you past everything that’s truly doesn’t matter and well its just a love song that gives hope in dark times.  

There have been so many bands in my lifetime that give you a reason to, shout and fight against a systemically wrong world like The Jam, The Clash, Crass or give you a feeling of belonging like Angelic Upstarts, Buzzccks or Rancid, so to find a band who do all of these things and more, is a pure joy.  This latest album just sores and screams way above the mad crowd of albums that exist or have existed, it could or should be a classic for years to come.

Anthems check, belonging check, rebellious check, love for life check, fucking outright roooooaaaar big check!!

Out on February 17th via Hellcat Records UK or Hellcat Records US

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