Fresh Picks: GutterLIFE – The Best Punk Blend.

Editor’s Note: Welcome to the very first in a new line of features here on Musically Fresh, our ‘Fresh Picks’. Our time spent writing for the website these days primarily consists of reviewing and featuring the incredible emerging bands that contact us on a daily bases, asking us if we could provide them with a platform to showcase their work to a new audience.

But this doesn’t mean we, as music fans, still don’t come across a band from times-to-time, either through social media, friend recommendations or just plain ol’ luck, which we believe our readers just have to hear and discover for themselves. So, we came up with ‘Fresh Picks’, an opportunity to showcase the bands we’ve come across and enjoyed. So, onto Matt’s words on GutterLIFE. #StayFresh

SA.

GutterLIFE – Long Island, New York (and soon to be California) – USA.

‘Alternative Punk’

Photo credit goes to Stephen LaMarche – CLICK HERE

I was shown this band by one of our staff at MF and within minutes I was hooked.

My taste in Punk encapsulates a great deal of its styles and sub-genres; the many branches of the same tree. It is rare, however, that I find a band so able to literally blend them together and not, to put it bluntly, sound shit.

The band have released two EPs since their formation in 2013, Violent Dischord – 2014 and Don’t Sleep – 2015. A total of twelve tracks of Punk-Rock music that repeatedly screams, shouts, sings, and accosts with that defiant raised fist and ironically seductive abrasive wall of noise, that keeps the burning fire to question, well fucking aflame.

I listen to GutterLIFE and the “For Fans Of…” and “Genre Drops” references are all over the show. Three-pronged Hardcore with the old-school, the new-school and more Melodic Hardcore, atop a generally mild Post-Hardcore twang. Then throw in some Abrasive Punk and hard edged Pop-Punk that has as much in the way of melodies and hooks as it does honesty and aggression.

SOME of what came to mind: Sick Of It All, Comeback Kid, No Trigger, Such Gold, This Is Hell, Leftover Crack.

The above genres and bands shouldn’t be taken literally. GutterLIFE have their own sound and their own tag as ‘Alternative Punk’, fits them perfectly.

Each song has it’s own take on the genre. Upbeat tracks such as ‘Revolution Radio’ and ‘Like Cattle’ are more melodic without losing the Hardcore bite, while others such as ‘Complacent’ ply some NYC Hardcore, all whilst ‘RFID’ pens a more old-school Hardcore Punk approach.

It’s not even as simple as that with GutterLIFE, as each song mixes things up within itself as much as each EP does with it’s track listing. Faith in Punk? Restored. I can’t wait for the full-length.

Find the band via the following info and direct links and check the track below:

• Check Facebook and Twitter for general updates.
• Music downloads can be found on iTunes, Spotify and Amazon.
• Physical copies and Merch can be found at the band’s page at Victory Merch by clicking HERE.
• Streaming is available via the band’s bandcamp and Spotify pages.

Don’t forget to #StayFresh and check out my personal favourite from the band below:

 ‘…I’m a rebel mother-fucker, I was born to be free…’