The wondrous Sheer Mag have a new EP out and it’s great. Of course it is – because every track they’ve released since September 2014 has been great.
The American band have a never-ending stream of impossibly catchy guitar and bass riffs, and their recording approach is old school (probably on 8-track, at a guess), with drums that sound like they’ve taken inspiration from a Mekons record and a distorted effect on singer Tina Halladay’s vocals that harks back to the late 90s/early 00s days of The Dirtbombs and White Stripes.
Speaking of which, I’d love to see them do one of those Third Man Records releases with the blue covers. But maybe that’s not their scene? The band still haven’t signed a conventional record deal, despite having pretty much everyone in the business try to win them over (repeatedly). It’s now, after 12 songs across three EP’s, looking increasingly like that situation won’t change any time soon, which puts us in an interesting position: a blatantly amazing band who’ve technically already released a 9/10 album (the EP’s combined), but couldn’t care less about getting any bigger than they already are. Which is… their prerogative?
