Known for backing psychedelic wunderkinds Tame Impala, Perth-based The Growl have finally stepped into the limelight with their debut album What Would Christ Do??
Scruffy with a spot of five o’clock shadow, this grungy quintet brings forth their industrialized fuzz rock without mercy.
Debut single “Cleaver Lever” with its bluesy grit and hooky vocals recycles a greasy residue left over by opening track “Eleven”.
While album highlight “John The Revelator” indulges in dirty harmonica and a distorted mythical narrative.
Experimental industrial electronica informs the clanging delirium of “Niywtlwoe” whilst the likes of “In The Belly Of The Beast” feeds on dark lo-fi roots-folk.
The musical dexterity showcased by The Growl throughout the album is a testament to their uncanny ability to establish a ranging aural aesthetic through only handful of songs, forming various genre-pockets across the eleven tacks.
Such sleight of hand is demonstrated in the latter half of What Would Christ Do??, where fabled folk-blues is seamlessly replaced by filthy Spaghetti-Western guitar, full of lazy reverb licks and grating feedback.
Through this uncompromising and brilliantly deranged debut, The Growl have proven to be more than just an indie ‘one-trick pony’, effectively contributing to the exciting alternative rock scene being pioneered out west.
