It’s not often you’re confronted by a Coventry-based indie trio led by two Chilean brothers, but such is the skewhiff world of highly promising young scuzz-punk power popsters THE RIPPS, whose debut single ‘Vandals’ follows hot on the heels of a teeth-cutting season on the circuit supporting the hotly-tipped likes of The Dead ‘60s, Maximo Park, Editors and The Young Knives.
Signed to Brighton-based label Catskills Records, The Ripps – collectively Patch Lagunas (guitar/vocals), Raul Lagunas (bass/vocals) and drummer Rachel Butt – probably weren’t even a glint in their parents’ eyes when the bands they most resemble (Buzzcocks, The Jam circa ‘All Mod Cons’) were basking in the TOTP attention, but they’ve done their homework meticulously, because the seethingly hyperactive ‘Vandals’ really does hard back to those halcyon late ‘70s days. Actually, the only more ‘contemporary’ waxing ‘Vandals’ obviously recalls is Supergrass’s evergreen ‘Caught By The Fuzz’ and indeed here our young heroes-in-waiting are also having their collars felt by the boys in blue. Come the chorus, Patch and Raul are dispensing the naughty-boy lyrics (“you’ve been nicked and it’s about time/ you’ve only got the one phone call”) with some gusto and looking round for a brace of phone boxes to attack.
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Nominal flipside ‘Hypocrites’ pushes similar buttons but with even tenser guitars. This time, the lyrics apparently relate to the Lagunas’s parents exploits as political activists during the dark days of Pinochet’s Chile, but such is the energetic attack of the band’s irresistible punky rush that they could be singing about hotwiring vintage Ford Cortinas with bald tyres for all I know or care. Whatever, the energy and passion is present and correct and – until their debut album ‘Long Live The Ripps!” – rolls around in February, this spunky little double A-side will do very nicely as a house guest. Providing I nail down the furniture, of course.
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