Bronx

First off, these guys have the best album cover of the year sealed up with zero competition in sight. It’s a close-up picture of a female vampire’s face with blood oozing all over her fangs, lips and chin spelling out the name the Bronx in the drooled streams. As for the music, it doesn’t quite live up to the cover. Recorded by ex(?) Guns N’ Roses member Gilby Clarke, the Bronx play ever-so-slightly emo hard punk with a few zigs and a few zags thrown in for good measure. Fast and hard with crushing production, songs like "Heart Attack American" and "False Alarm" are muscular and sound a bit like a horn-free Rocket From the Crypt with a real screamer of a singer leading the charge. Actually, the singer is kind of the weak link here with his one-note yelling act getting tired by song three. This band’s got the chops and the balls, they’ve just got to get the vocal arrangement and songwriting up to speed and they’d be pretty much unstoppable. Great cover, though!