Concert Review: Punk at the Wine Cellar – Thunderground, Boneshakers, Snitch Jimmy, Jiahu Symbols  18 June 2021

Thunderground, Boneshakers, Snitch Jimmy and Jiahu Symbols. It’s time again for a Blitzkrieg Bop as The Wine Cellar hosts four young Punk bands out to give you a good old thrashing and spit you out better for it.

Forty-five years ago, the Sex Pistols detonated Anarchy in the UK and the Ramones laid down the vision. That’s the moment in history but of course it’s much wider than that. Let’s see what the current mercenaries are doing with it.

Thunderground

This is the sound of Nu-Punk where bands are taking the ferocious energy and brevity of the original sound and grafting on more firepower with fast Metal and even some Prog Rock.

They are Richard Giles voice, Robert Picot guitar, Tom Bambury bass and James Hoyle drums.

Opening song What You Want lays down their manifesto. Fast metal guitar, Picot is playing an extremely cool-looking 8-string Ibanez. A 5-string bass also on stage, which adds a deeper tone. Singer looks like a skinny meth-addled rooster, prancing around the stage and blending his intense singing into the sound wall. Several fuck you’s! break the surface.

Mick Jagger strut, crossed with Iggy Pop who copied his stage craft and took it to crazy, and you get an idea of the visual impact.

A number of songs begin with fast and complex Prog riffs which bend into metal. Johnny Rotten was a fan of the likes of Hawkwind, Can and even the dreaded Pink Floyd.

Street King has the brutal but thrilling crunching riffs of Trampled Underfoot. Are they Zeppelin fans? Guitarist is wearing a Mastodon tee-shirt.

They play great towering riffs all over the place.

Get Down starts with heavy artillery covering fire from the drums. Singer is howling out venom and rage. Guitar shedding electricity riffs and doing the Metal head-shake.

Great cover of Black Sabbaths Paranoid. A nod to the overlooked innovators.

They announce Coven Delight from the stage but the actual title is Confident Liar. I like my mis-heard title, can you build a song around that, guys? Simple and brutal done MC5 style, with plenty of humour. Something about a dick? Guitar lays out Stooges guitar riffs to end the tune.

He then gets to show his chops on I Need It. A slow entry, for a change. Then some Hendrix Voodoo Chile pyrotechnics going into overdrive.

A great band and they put out some serious energy to get the small space moshing.

Boneshakers

Three-piece Auckland band who base their attack closer to Rock’n’Roll and Power Pop roots. They are leader and voice Chris Long, Todd Wright and Ethan Long.

Start with the Beatle’s Help. But loud and bratty and full of rage. The music hurtles out like a boy-racer.

Listen to Your Heart is melodic Pop stripped back to simple elements and given a dose of fire-power.

They call Eyes a love song, but it sounds like the Go-Go’s Vacation with testosterone.

Crucify opens with tribal drums and rolling thunder bass with resonates through the floor. Squalls of guitar. Same on Eagles, with shouty Punk vocals.

The engine room drums and bass keep up the momentum for the whole set and batter you into submission. In a liberating way. Demonstrated on their cover of the Ramones Havana Affair.

They have got that monolithic but coolly detached wall-of-sound down pat.

Snitch Jimmy

A Westie four-piece band roaring out at you from the Boganville of Massey. Not long out of  High School and an example that NCEA can produce something good.

Sorry lads but the only names I can muster up are Tradie Liam, Blazy Mo and Techie Joe.

Are we calling Punk Dad Rock yet? They lay out the manifesto with a cool and absolutely on-point version of the Ramones Blitzkreig Bop.

Prior to that they lay into a good trawl through the many influences which went into creating that original Classic Punk sound

A couple of songs to get the juices and chemicals flowing. Apparently, they had quit six months ago but were coaxed out for this night.

Skeleton is Hard Pop with which they work up some Punk rage and venom. Sick of your rules/ Fuck that. More eloquent than Pink Floyd, who we hate, right! They put in some flash guitar licks. Certainly, have the musical chops, and they get better as they work through their set.

Wasteland is reminiscent of that early Power-Pop sound of the Jam. These young guys have a good time on stage, exuberant and full of humour.

Not taking themselves too seriously and when you can do that a lot of good things are permitted to enter.

Parrot is off their first album and actually fixes them as a good Power-Pop outfit. Up-beat riffs to start, a brief drone passage in the middle, bratty and deliberately abrasive vocals.

Sounds like they’re back then.

Jiahu Symbols

This trio are the newest band tonight, having been playing less than a year. They are Andrew Murray-Brown guitar and voice, Howl Griffiths drums and Mitch Cramer bass.

They have got a sound heavily influenced by Husker Du on their first few songs. Similar rolling tsunami of guitar texture. We are told the one being played cost thirty dollars at a second-hand shop. Of course, that may make the crucial difference.

Make myself believe there is something better. They vary it a bit with abrasive Power-Pop, Buzzcocks style.

Scattered my ashes. Melodic Folk-Pop guitar intro. Some naïve singing like Jonathan Richman. Well, he was an early Punk touchstone, especially for John Lydon. Then they wind up the energy and back comes the guitar drone.

Four bands tonight keeping the faith with tradition and taking it into new exciting territory. Am I calling Punk tradition? It was meant to stomp on all that impacted narcissism of Stadium Rock, at the time. It did that and liberated a great spirit which continues.

Hey Ho, Lets Go, The Kids are losin’ their minds…

Rev Orange Peel

Click any image to view a full gallery of shots from the show.