Record Review // The Venomous Pinks "We Do It Better" (SquidHat Records)

$7 //
https://squidhat.bandcamp.com/album/we-do-it-better //

"We Do It Better" begins with "Anything you can do I can do it better" and that becomes the theme of the first song.   Crunchy guitar chords and early Green Day-esque bass riffs create a song which is so fast paced and in your face I'm not even sure who to compare this with.    There should be an entire community dedicated to all female bands (I would want to be a part of it) but as of right now the only other all female punk band I can think of is Damn Broads.

"Nightmare" falls somewhere between early The Offspring and Misfits as the song claims to keep us up all night as a "Walking Nightmare".   I imagine someone taking a leap back in time to the 1950's and playing this for someone in that era.  "No, no, no, women are not supposed to speak and act like this!"   Ha!  It's 2018.  Women can act however they want.  The sad thing is though, some probably do still hold those conservative values about women.

You can really hear the "Gorgeous" era Guttermouth come out in the song "Pizza Slice" and, yes, as the vocals are screamed "Slice! Slice! Slice!" it's hard to remember that you could be watching a circle pit form to a song about pizza.   I mean, some people take their pizza very seriously and sometimes I like to think I'm one of those people.  Other times I order Domino's.   But, what other song has such a great breakdown?

On the flip side, "Mantis" opens up with as much raw energy and violence as any punk song I've ever heard- maybe even more.    There are also a lot of fuck you toos.    "Radar" opens up with some more melody, though, which sounds kind of like The Muffs but could easily be something off of the "10 Things I Hate About You" soundtrack.    It's a song about being off of someone's radar and it ends with "It's time to say goodbye".

What I like most about The Venomous Pinks is that they have this true punk rock sound and it's not being compromised for any reason.   "We Do It Better" has this feeling where each of the five songs stands out on its own merits and then somehow still has that overall feeling where you feel them all come together as they are by the same band.   While it would be easier to create a group of songs that all sound the same, The Venomous Pinks prove that the easy way is not always the best way.