Look up ‘scuzzy lo-fi electro-punk pop’ in an up-to-date dictionary and you’ll find a picture of this trash-noise duo. The audaciously-titled ‘Greatest Hits’ is their debut release, and is a fizzy, fucked-up shot of adrenaline that crackles and hisses its way out of the speakers in a frenzy of splenetic hyperactivity and gleefully anarchic rebellion.
The songs are every bit as ace and as rampantly riotous as titles like ‘I Wanna be in a Democracy’, ‘Pushchair Suicide’, God Save My Screen’, Motherfolkers’, ‘Oh Boy She Moans’ and, er, ‘Daddy’s Bulge’ suggest.
Ramshackle, roughshod, wildly varied, it’s not the technical competence or slick production that makes this a great album, but the passion and overt irreverence and the fact that you can tell they’re having FUN! Acts like Maria and the Gay exist to remind us what making music, especially punk music is – or should – be all about. It’s not about making money, it’s not about filling stadiums or global adulation, celebrity, posing or any of that peripheral crap, it’s about capturing the moment, it’s about doing your own thing. It’s got nothing whatsoever to do with commercial potential and marketability.
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Yet in ignoring all of these things, Maria and the Gay have created a document that is so refreshing, exhilarating and such a joy to listen to, that I can’t help thinking they’re going to get a lot of people very excited.
Oh, and the cover of ‘White Wedding’ is a work of genius that’s worth the money alone.
Maria and the Gay Online
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