CLEAR VINYL.
Dead Finks is the musical output of New Zealand-born duo Joseph Thomas and Erin Violet. Formed in Sydney sometime in the late '10s, it's current incarnation is a four-piece rock band based in Berlin.
On The Death & Resurrection Of Johnathan Cowboy the band showcase an incredible knack for writing catchy and unique melodies. They play punk music in the tradition of Wire or Sonic Youth and take cues from contemporaries like Parquet Courts and Iceage in their efforts to manipulate and expand upon what it means to be a punk group in 2021.
Written and recorded in Sydney, late 2018 (shortly before the duo moved to Berlin) the LP serves as a strange prediction of the horrible state of the world today. Songs about war, plagues, pissing, police, David Cronenberg’s Videodrome and the climate burning. Its a sea of wiry guitars and thumping bass that plants itself inside your inner ear and doesn’t leave. Thomas’ smart-ass delivery and literary style with odd references abounding, sees a return to something similarly touched upon in his previous group Trust Punks. However, on this LP Dead Finks feel more straight-forward in the best kind of way. Stripped down rock music that knows what it is and smashes you over the head. Vocal harmonies and lush organ sounds. It sounds really good. Divorcing somewhat on this release from the harsh underground sounds of previous iterations of the band.
An extremely strange synchronicity. Some will try and say it was planned. It wasn’t. This is art working in mysterious ways. Hopefully for some of you it will help. Personally, these songs transcend this horrible situation we are collectively going through. But they cannot be exempt from being looked at through the gaze of a world stricken by plague. It’s the Death… & RESURRECTION of Johnathon Cowboy; you, me & everyone else.
