With tender ages between them and only one previous fuzz-filled release recorded in various London bedsits, we’re suddenly looking down the barrel of a full-fledged LP on the revered Upset The Rhythm imprint for Trash Kit. It’s a gaping leap for a band that built up hype in the last year with non-stop touring, but its members — Rachel Agg, Rachel Horwood, and Ros Murray — don’t appear to be intimidated by it at all. Unless they have astonishingly low aspirations, we can assume sarcasm when they drawl “We ride the MegaBus/ We’re all famous now” on “Fame,” highlighting their self-awareness at the growing vacancy between internet reputation and reality. It’s a refreshing update on an era that’s in dire need of a refurbishment.
There are clear influences here, yet Trash Kit mostly use them as hastily assembled foundations for their precarious mash of sounds, drawing from the same pot of ideas as many late-70s post-punk all-girl acts — stripped-back, off-kilter, and upbeat. While they could’ve settled down and hammered out half-assed Slits tributes, they instead play with African polyrhythms, licked-clean guitar, and their own brand of sardonic lyrics. In other words, they aren’t afraid to showcase their virtuosity, so rather than strumming a series of open chords with less enthusiasm than a sloth on benzodiazepines, Trash Kit fit flurries of crystal-clear notes in the tiniest crevices.
But Trash Kit are subject to the same conundrum many bands are currently facing: what happens when a lo-fi act gains access to hi-fi potential? It worked wonders for Zola Jesus, but when you remove the fuzz for Trash Kit, it sounds a little like they’re the mistakenly booked band at a business event. There’s a slight awkwardness to the record that Trash Kit avoid, and when we should be hearing screams delivered with wild abandon, we get a rather more muted affair.
And make no mistake: if you’re a prog fan, you’ll vomit onto your spangly boots simply upon hearing the statistics of this record. There are 17 songs lasting only 27 minutes. This means four songs don’t reach one minute, eight don’t reach two, and only one reaches three. While the band describes the songs as being “as long as they need to be,” I can’t help but feel that “New Face” and “Bugsy” wilt prematurely. Further, this is all squeezed into just a few days of recording, presumably to capture the unadulterated energy of the band as a series of live performances with a smattering of mixing and mastering tagged on. If there was an odd semitone out here or there, it would be in the name of character. It’s a befitting attitude for a brand of music designed to be red-raw, but this isn’t quite what we get: each member sounds like they’re sitting in their own booth, oblivious to each other’s actions.
It’s unfortunate too. Earlier this year, I was lucky enough to catch Trash Kit perform at Matt Groening’s ATP in a converted Butlins in Minehead. It was midnight, in a hall usually occupied by those with a penchant for bingo and/or the Macarena. For a band so rooted in girl punk, they had the difficult task of following The Raincoats. But the pressure didn’t faze them. Their ferocious chanting and “primitive” aesthetics exuded energy in short blasts of complex noise that was utterly arresting, utterly entertaining. On Trash Kit, however, they didn’t quite capture their live energy. While something can be said of their efforts to refract their sunshine onto disc in just a few days, perhaps something more substantial could’ve been said with more time and thought.
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