Manchester’s Wax Head open their debut album with the kind of manic, intense energy that Ministry would use to launch their records with vocals so drenched in delay and muddy distortion that they’re barely decipherable. GNAT is a spooky, kooky, sweaty and tremendous horror punk record where everything feels a little warped and wrong.

The sonic world is monochromatic and deliberately degraded with the vocals so processed that you can’t make out the words most of the time. The songwriting is far less poppy than the Misfits but the spirit of horror and comedy connecting to manic sweaty chaotic punk is there in spades. With a combination of really fast, thrashy punk and interesting retro synth work, the band want you to dance while making you feel a bit unnerved. Bug Doctor is manic, and Terminal Sinker tips more into psychobilly territory with loose-limbed surf undertones and rock and roll swagger. Rusty Cutter is a dirty blues jam that lurches with menace, and Resin214 hands the wheel to the synthesizer with every other instrument following its lead and the whole song sounding like a mad scientist’s equipment powering up. The closer Clamp is blindingly fast and sounds perfect for Halloween night, though quite what gives it that quality is difficult to pin down given how indecipherable the words are. Most of the tracks build to an explosion in the chorus and the whole album is done and dusted in under thirty minutes. It absolutely makes you want to see them live. A grinning rock and roll show with a macabre streak, GNAT is an extremely exciting debut from a band with a very specific and enjoyable vision. In most horror punk, the horror element is right there in the words but here the spookiness comes from the sound itself. Some listeners will hear this as a garage rock record and leave it at that, but the degraded production and murky atmosphere feels locked to a very specific and beloved tradition.