I'd got the impression that Jon Chapple had quit McLusky because the unthinkable had happened with last year's "The Difference Between You & Me Is That I'm Not On Fire" album and it had actually sold well, giving them a modicum of the success that hardcore indier-than-thou refuseniks weren't supposed to experience regardless of which way the zeitgeist was blowing.
However, it turns out that his 'new' band, the immortally-named SHOOTING AT UNARMED MEN have been stumbling around in various guises since 1999 and had actually co-existed during Chapple's tenure in McLusky, so what do I know?
Well, I do know that while Chapple may have switched allegiances with his Cardiff-based sonic conspirators, his heart remains with spiky, oddball indie-core and the kind of bands whose idea of chartbound choruses are the sort of things that constitute Mystery Jets B-sides. And I don't mean that as a slight, for while SHOOTING AT UNARMED MEN are surely cut from a similar (though generally less heavy and brooding) cloth as McLusky, they have an off-kilter pop logic of their own that engages pretty well during the course of "Soon There Will Be..."s 34 minutes.
Opening track "Taking Care Of Business" gives you some idea what to expect. Though it sells you a brief dummy with its' deceptively gentle guitar and bass, Steve Morgan's determined drum motif drives them on and guitarist Simon Alexander soon adopts the expected anti-singing vocal stance. It works in this context, mind, and the chanted "fire does not discriminate!" kiss-off line is undeniably enigmatic and intriguing.
It's not the only highlight either, as tracks like "The Long & The Short Of It" and "The Pink Ink" also have plenty going for them. The former features a crazed blowout of an intro before assembling itself into low-riding angular indie ("He cuts off his nose and keeps his pride!") complete with a charming, but bizarre call'n'response sequence between Alexander and Chapple, while "The Pink Ink" opens with (probably) Alexander saying "Every time I went up to it with my face it fucking squealed" (??) before the song itself settles into perky, bitten-off (post)pop akin to a Welsh fIREHOSE.
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The best track, though, is surely the marvellous "Four-Eyed McClayvie", which is led by some fluid and inspired bass playing from Chapple and a great bolstering chant of "he's got that evil look in his eye, eye, eye!" which is instantly addictive. Alexander's vocals are growly, harrassed and just about perfect in this context and, fittingly, it all ends in a massive, free-for-all of an ending. Exhilarating stuff.
It doesn't all pass muster quite so well, mind. Songs like "Impunity Rules" sound a bit too deliberately obtuse in their quest to be bug-eyed and manic and sometimes you begin to feel the most anarchic thing they could do would be to write a linear indie pop tune with all the knots, kinks and weirdo time signatures removed just for the hell of it. But then, old indie hardcore habits die hard, and while Shooting At Unarmed Men are unlikely to get caught in major commercial crossfire along the way, they sure as hell ain't firing blanks neither.
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