Heckspoiler – Tokyo Drift LP (Noise Appeal Records)

Here’s another outstanding release by Noise Appeal Records. Heckspoiler are back with their highly anticipated second full-length album that serves as more than an adequate follow-up to its predecessor. It’s been two years since Heckspoiler unleashed their debut, Synthetik Athletik, which gathered so many positive critics not only in Austria but all across the globe. There’s pretty much a good reason for the success. This duo possesses everything. Synthetik Athletik carries a healthy dosage of wittiness, creativity, ideas, musicianship, and energy, all the properties that define excellent underground music releases. Today, this duo arrives with Tokyo Drift, another tremendous material that sounds superior in comparison to the beforementioned debut. Now, you can imagine how good Tokyo Drift is when Synthetik Athletik is an album without flaws.

Tokyo Drift carries eleven abrasive, raw, energetic hardcore punk tracks. Now, if you aren’t familiar with the sound of Heckspoiler, the first thing you should know is that these guys perform every song as the rhythm section would. Heckspoiler combines bass guitar and drums since day one, and they practice that on Tokyo Drift as well. Many bands practiced this technic, but only a few managed to sound so intense as Heckspoiler. There’s something about their music that will force you to listen to Tokyo Drift repeatedly. If you kept your eyes peeled on their social media pages, you probably caught up with all three singles that the band used to promote this release. Those singles were an incredible overture into the improved sound of the band.

Somehow, these guys polished their sound without losing that relentless aggression that defines their music. The fuzziness, dirtiness, and rawness are still there, presented in layers of cleverly assembled basslines, but everything sounds much cleaner. Also, these low-end tones sound heavier than before. I listened to so many recordings that included electric guitars in the mix, but none of those can compare to this bass guitar sound on Tokyo Drift. It seems like the lows and highs are volumed up on the equalizer pedal, but the mids are all the way down. Therefore, the sound is crunchy, chunky, and heavily distorted, but you’ll sometimes hear clear warm-sounding tones. Of course, the impressive drumming performance keeps these songs in line with excellent rhythmic sequences, continuous splashing over cymbals, various accentuations, fills, and tempo changes. It’s also mindblowing how both instruments articulate together in harmony.

Besides the sheer dominance of hardcore punk, Heckspoiler also combine only the best characteristics of punk rock, action rock, stoner rock, garage rock, and noise rock. As you probably know already, all these subgenres of rock work like a charm, while the primary music direction provides more than necessary aggression, massiveness, and energy. Tokyo Drift also looks eye-peeling. The vinyl includes stunning cardboard packaging, colored in blue and pink neon. The inlay carries all the necessary information about this release and follows the outer packaging with the same colors. Tokyo Drift comes on crystal blue vinyl, but you can also grab a compact disc, cassette or purchase the album digitally via Noise Appeal Records. Head over to the Noise Appeal Records website for more information about ordering.