When it comes to punk, few men still in the business have the experience that John Robb has. Frontman of The Membranes, a band that was part of the original first wave of UK punk and that formed in 1977, Robb formed his current band Goldblade in the mid-1990s. Mutiny is their fifth album, and the second to be recorded by the current line-up.Not surprisingly, Mutiny has a piratical theme, which works well with the swashbuckling tone of the band's music and the inherently aggressive, anti-establishment nature of punk. In keeping with this, the band apparently plan to “tear up the stage like a gang of mutant pirates armed with a lyrical cutlass of searing social commentary”. Brilliant!The album comes across as a sort of mixture between conventional UK punk, American hardcore varieties, and a strong populist outlook. Many of the songs are under three minutes, and are dominated by very aggressive drumming and chainsaw-esque thrashy guitars, as with as Robb's coarse, occasionally slightly Joe Strummer-like voice. The themes being explored here are very typical ”“ there's a song about rioting and police brutality (the inspiringly-titled “Riot Riot”), there's a song about drugs (“Everybody's On Drugs”), one about the punk D.I.Y. aesthetic (“D.I.Y.”)... you're beginning to get the idea. Because of this the album seems like its non-conformity consists of conforming to a very classic punk template ”“ the choruses of virtually every song are unashamedly anthemic and consist largely of the song's title being repeated multiple times.But there's not a lot wrong with that ”“ you can expect a bit of a formulaic bent on modern punk records, it's almost part of the appeal. Robb's motley crew are uncompromising musicians, and the sledgehammer subtlety of the band's assault will be appealing to anyone who's enjoyed anything by other, older punk bands. There are more original touches elsewhere, as on the title track which has some amusingly pirate-y stylings to it ”“ in fact, the acoustic version, which appears here as “some buried treasure for your pleasure” could be passed off quite convincingly as a particularly brash pirate sea shanty from 1784 or something ”“ not that my knowledge of pirate historical musicology is really that complete.Punk is often at least partly about using a rocket launcher when a fly swat would do ”“ if that's your thing, you could do much worse than give Mutiny a shot. Anthemic, heavy and uncompromising, it's a solid and entertaining, if not hugely original, punk record. 74%Links Goldblade [official site] [PunkRockers.com profile]