Hot Cops - Dumbbo
- Review by Noël Duplaa
Info: Belfast-based, grungey 3 piece Hot Cops continue to deliver on their ever growing promise with their new single, 'Dummbo'. Out now on Paper Trail Records, it’s another triumphant demonstration of the band’s masterful balance of melody, dynamics and baseball-to-the-head heft.
A serrated guitar cuts an eerie, warped squall as a menacing, lumbering bassline stalks relentlessly towards you like the It Follows monster and the scene is set. Building a haunted house around a cascading nursery rhyme melody that subtly accumulates more heft and sneer with each rotation, the lead singer desperately screaming “when I say your name I choke,” until the song literally bursts at the seams, guitars, bass and drums combining into a buzzsaw frenzy.
I’m not going to lie, with their Arrested Development referencing name, I was absolutely primed to like Hot Cops, but I literally can’t find anything not to love about this song. I’m in love with their sound and entire aesthetic - rooted in the weirder more expansive side of grunge, epitomised by the likes of Pavement or Dinosaur Jr. - their masterful control of tension, the way they balance the heaviness of the guitars with an instinctive knack for melody. And just listen to the perfect moment where lead singer Carl Eccles drily chimes “I feel so sorry when I sing, for everybody listening who’ll never hear a voice so sweet,” his voice rising to a falsetto to hammer the punchline home. This is a great song by a band who seem to be making a habit of writing great songs - dynamic, tense, funny, vicious and the type of earworm you’ll relish having stuck in your head for weeks.
Look / Like / Listen & Follow:
Website: http://hot-cops.bandcamp.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HotCopsNI
Spotify: https://play.spotify.com/album/3L4ethOXqXMKQmcg9FcfyG
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HotCopsNI
