DOWNLOAD: Impedance Sampler (w/ Hy-Test's "Girl in Black", Nick Oliveri's "This Isn't Love", etc.)

Following up on their 2006 EP “The Little Band That Could”, Wollongong, Australia garage-punk outfit Hy-Test have just released their debut full-length, Dishing Out the Good Times (Impedance Records). This disc finds the band on the same label as Nick Oliveri and Hy-Test bassist/vocalist Luke Armstrong and guitarist/vocalist Mick Curley were most recently members of Mondo Generator’s 2010-touring lineup.

The tie to Mondo Generator gives a good indication of what to expect from Dishing Out the Good Times. The brunt of the disc is fuzzed-out garage punk but there are significant elements of hardcore toward the later half of the disc. The disc’s eleven tracks barrel by in just under 30 minutes leaving the listener with barely enough time to catch their breath.

Here is a live video from a few years back that gives a good indication of the ferocity of the band’s live show.



While the band sticks to their high-energy format across this disc, there are enough stylistic surprises to keep the listener's attention. The disc starts strong with the driving, grungy opening-track “9 Volt” and goes from there into the hard-edged power pop of “Girl in Black”. “Crazy for You” starts with a spoken word/funk groove which leads into an explosive breakdown. From here, the band goes through alt-rock (“Magnet”), MC5-style R&B (“Goodbye”), and straightforward hardcore (“Our Career”, “Smokeskull”). Finishing up the disc is the instrumental “Rambling of a Mute”.

There is more than enough to like here so…fingers crossed for a US tour sometime in the near future.

Links:
Hy-Test