Review – ASD “Pills / The Letter”
The suburbs of Adelaide have spawned yet another group of committed artists and musicians, performing under the banner ASD. Their discography already includes two EPs and a video from 1999 and the plan is for another outing around Christmas. In the meantime this promo single is as good an introduction to a band as any, with two very different tracks: “Pills” and “The Letter.”
Boasting punk, funk, soul, blues, reggae, rock, pop and African muses, ASD have already appeared in the favoured National free-to-air- and cable-TV shows and channels. And their brag-sheet continues with appearances with the likes of Testeagles, The Avalanches, Beasts of Bourbon, pre_shrunk, Powderfinger, Regurgitator, diana Ah naid, The Living End, The Mavis’s and Spiderbait (to reduce an impressive and lengthy list to something more manageable and still indicate ASD’s diversity). These two songs, however, give quite a different impression altogether.
Pills comes over as early Grinspoon with dashes of Phil-as-John-Lydon (as was Phil’s want back in their “Dead Cat” and “Licker Bottle Cozy” days) while the All Time Favoured Expletive is so gratuitous in its application it’s beyond redundant. Behind all this there’s the double-kick / double-snare driving punk beat that is not only packing them in but getting the band invited back at all the good venues. A good set opener that would, by their rap sheet, set the mood very quickly but, by the same token, be difficult to follow up! The Letter then replaces all this with a meld of Les Claypool and Phil/Lydon singing an as-gentle-as-these-guys-get love-lost ditty featuring an uncredited Jethro Tull/Canned Heat influence.
I’ve listened to the single a number of times now in as many
settings. The initial ambient garner-a-reaction listen didn’t win any hearts,
but the headphone look-for-redeeming-qualities / write-the-article listens
brought my review back from an absolute panning. The drum work on Pills
is quite remarkable; the aforementioned uncredited flautist is a nice touch on The
Letter; taking the stated influences and rap sheet into account along with
further listens to the back-catalogue might just win this critic over to the ASD
side of the paddock…