Blast Worship: Gets Worse

Where they from? Leeds, a small city in the western Yorkshire district of the United Kingdom. During WWI, British military divisions were composed of service men from the same towns and cities and the division from Leeds was the 15th Battalion of the Prince Of Wale’s Own. This division suffered major casualties during the 1916 battle of the Somme river in France. A survivor of the battle described it as such: “We (the 15th  battalion) were two years in the making ten minutes in the destroying.” During WWII, Great Britain gave up the practice of basing divisions around the geographic origins of its recruits.

What do they sound like? Like a British version of Weekend Nachos but with less of a “bro” element and more of a “gonzo” one.

Why the hype? I was so glad to see this band had released a new album this year because prior to that I had been spinning their 2017 full-length, L.S.P.V., in heavy rotation and was happy to finally have an excuse to nerdsterbate about them in my little column here. And yeah, I know, this is the second powerviolence band in a row I’ve covered here but get over yourself, nerds. This band can blast with the best of ‘em.

No modern powerviolence band (no modern heavy band, really) has quite perfected the dynamic of crazy-stupid fast into ignorant, knuckle-dragging slow parts like these Leeds pals do. The best Gets Worse songs are roller coasters of high and low velocities that serve as various unexpected nut-punches all delivered with an atmosphere that dances the line between the absurd and the truly hateful.

Latest release: Snubbed, which more or less picks up where L.S.P.V. left off but with a few more experimental dirges like the noise-laden intro to “Fun Borrower” and the Sabbath-y groove to album closer “Rest In Schromph.”

Favorite Track: I gotta go with “Pretzel Limbs” off of L.S.P.V. It perfectly sums up this band’s greatest strengths, namely how the stupidly fast and jittering opening section collapses into one of the greatest fight riffs this side of “Unforgivable.” Take a listen and try not punch a hole in the dry wall, bozo.