Pizzatramp – The Last Supper

We checked out Pizzatramp at Rebellion 2024, as we always do, and made sure to have a look at The Punk Site Fuckometer a number of times during the set. We can confirm that the readings remained consistent at zero fucks given. That’s why we love these sarcastic scallywags. They genuinely don’t care, and if there’s a more pointed gesture of their disdain for you, me and everybody else than Jim‘s side–of-stage mid-set vomit, I’d be very surprised. And yet for all their disdain and rambunctious tomfoolery, Pizzatramp are deeply beloved. They go there. Angry machine gun bursts of vituperative hardcore skate punk are what you’re gonna get and you’re going to enjoy it.

That’s why The Last Supper, despite its bile and fury, is a little bit sad. Described as the band’s last album, and that they’re going to finish the band ‘sometime in 2025’, this will probably be Pizzatramp‘s last testament. Opening track Armchair Activists Anonymous is an epic 2:46 of brutal hardcore that sets the tone for the tsunami of furious thrash that follows. But that’s not even the longest track, which is Bring Back Margaret Thatcher that thunders and grinds its way to a monumental 3:34 and is the second-best song about that woman currently available*. Title track The Last Supper puts an unhealthy spin on the non-meat diet (“I’ve been vegan for five self-righteous years …). Favourite track Cop Fetish which describes a very unhealthy fixation (“C’mon – show us yer badge!”) I Do My Own Research is a cautionary tale about forming opinions based on what can be found on the internet. The thankfully now outgoing Tory administration gets one right in the face from Skeletons, while gammon-faced racists get put to the sword by Flagshaggers. Most unsettling, however, is the album closer Zombies Have Feelings Too, with it’s ‘Every Rose Has Its Thorns’ vibe that details how misunderstood our flesh-eating chums are.

Pizzatramp‘s own PR is disingenuously self-deprecating. For all their professed lack of musical dexterity (‘Pizzatramp are a three piece three chord thrash punk band from South Wales‘) there is a lot more going on than the barrage of noise might initially suggest. The bass growls and the guitar buzzes like a tornado of very pissed-off hornets, both underscored by some of the most impossibly explosive speed drumming you’ll ever hear – this is a band playing down their playing ability. At times oddly tuneful, at others disconcertingly off-kilter, this is a band masking just how good they are but doing just enough to make sure that you know.

This is not an album of subtly expressed observations on modern society. It’s a series of savage jabs to your throat. It took three years to mature, like a volcanic Chicken Madras in a slow cooker and boy, does it have some kick. Short, furious blasts of thrash underscore Jim’s impassioned vocal and nobody is safe. It’s lazy reviewing, but appropriate to let Jim have the last word: “You can expect it to sound just like the last one, but with even more swearing, faster drums and at least one song about frying Nigel Farage’s testicles” 

*The first is ‘My Favourite Fact About Maggie‘ by Smoking Gives You Big Tits

The Last Supper is out now on TNSrecords. We heartily recommend that you go and get a hearty slice.