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Review: 'HAWK EYES'
'BRISTOL, THE LOUISIANA, 14 Feb 2015'   


-  Genre: 'Rock'

Our Rating:
HAWK EYES comprise Paul Astick (vocals / guitar), Rob Stephens (guitar), Ryan Clark (bass) and the all-new Steve Wilson (drums). For four people in one small room they make an agreeably disproportionate amount of glorious noise.

Now touring their fourth studio album (with a live bastard along the way) the HAWK EYES repertoire is very big and very heavy on muscle. Their creative juggernaut grows each time I hear them and here in Bristol we had the entrail-juddering, tightly-packed indoor version.

The Monday night straggle of a crowd took an early pounding and were more-or-less decimated by home time. The newer "Everything Is Fine" material is denser and richer than previous collections and I'm not sure that everyone was fully prepared for the onslaught. But how encouraging it is to see and hear bands that press on with building new repertoire and demanding more of listeners. No resting on early laurels for this lot. Their creative energy is fierce.

They used one of the new songs, "The Trap", to open the night. It's a militant song with soaring harmonies and very big war-time guitars. It carries hope and blind warning of apocalypse. Can I sense deeply embedded political anger? "More Than A Million" that follows has the same urgency and anxiety. It's a musically athletic sprint across rock falls and reverberations that threaten the building while Astick screams "Look out for Number One!" (Is this conversion to the dark side or a desperate attempt to escape the contagion of contemporary greed?). Power and noise can serve many masters.

"Witch Hunt" from the last album was exhilarating. Its audacious riff-mongering is a joy. I love its modern echo of Beethoven's Morse code V. "da da daaaah - da da daaaah (rpt till scared). "Ambassador" that follows shows the extent of Hawk Eyes' move into more complexity and subtlety. It's lurching time signature carries a much more complex lyrical and emotional content, wrestling with defective personality and moral indifference. It's serious stuff that is satisfyingly visceral if an adrenaline blast is all you need.

Through the next eleven songs of thunderous drumming, bursting guitars and geological bass it's a blur of fury and impossible density, packed with cunning riffs and roared defiance.

We were treated to:

Ambassador
Die Trying
Hollywood Sweatshop
Headstrung
Terribly Quelled
The Ballad Of Michael McGLue
Cheap
Enemies
Everything Is Fine
Bears By The Head
I Hate This, Do You Like It?

The new "Everything Is Fine" CD I bought on my way upstairs has been on ever since I got home.

http://www.hawkeyesmusic.com/

Wolverhampton's God Damn were a splendid opening act. They're an effects-intensive, inventive and wonderfully loud drums and guitar duo who are making some waves and (almost certainly) playing a gig near you soon. Thom and Ash sound like three people.

http://goddamntheband.com
  author: Sam Saunders

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HAWK EYES - BRISTOL, THE LOUISIANA, 14 Feb 2015
HAWK EYES
HAWK EYES - BRISTOL, THE LOUISIANA, 14 Feb 2015
HAWK EYES