Noise rock; a nice, lazy generalisation of a group of bands you can’t be arsed to describe properly. Christ, the word noise gives zero indication as to what you’re about to hear. Is it Merzbow style, all looped electronica and harsh distortion, or maybe something akin to Pissed Jeans, blurring the lines as they crash into the hardcore world? Even rock doesn’t help because you’re talking 60 years of history and I just don’t have the wordcount for that sort of nonsense.
Honestly Sofy Major do neither, though they clearly have a soft spot for the ‘Jeans boys; Idolize (Impure Muzik) is overflowing with groovy basslines, throat shredding yells and fancy time signature changes but they’re all mixed with a real knowledge of song writing, creating genuinely catchy ditties with punk rock attitudes, hard rock swagger and a fuzzy layer of distortion that coats the whole album like icing sugar.
The instrumentation is incredible, each member bringing different influences to the fold, allowing them to switch from tough guy hardcore on ‘Frost Forward’ to the sample heavy, 90’s Metallica-esque ‘Seb’ or the monolithic ‘Steven the Slow’, with Unsane’s Dave Curran on vocals.
For all the fancy words and genres you could throw at Idolize, a wonderfully apt name for an album made up of so many influences, Sofy Major make awesome music, pure and simple. Your first listen may be taken up by a game of “Spot the Reference” but as you repeat the album you’ll find it swallowing you, bobbing your head to each sweeping groove, fuzzed up guitar riff and frantic drum beat, until you can’t get it out of your head.
9/10
Matthew Tilt