Master Blaster - Darkroom - Christchurch 23 September 2017

As usual, I heard a great track from the new 7" EP on the "Counting The Beat" Podcast and liked what I heard, checked them out via Bandcamp and decided I needed to buy both their available records. Before I got the chance to do that, I found out they were actually playing a gig near me in support of the aforementioned 7" record, pictured above, and it was decided to go and check them out and pick up the records on the night(saving postage costs).

  It was election night as I arrived at the Darkroom just past the 9PM door opening time and so I settled down with a drink and my phone to check up on the vote counting while waiting for the first of the three punk bands to hit the stage.

 First band, Tyrannosaurus Wreck, a three piece, thrashing out their fast punky  songs, creating an enjoyable noise that begs the question where does it stop being punk and become Metal. It can be a fine line. I did enjoy their set.

  Nervous Jerk were next and this three piece was definitely firmly in the punk genre although the vocals were in that pop punk style, the music was a bit heavier. The Guitar in this band didn't really stand out much, so it becomes a bit of a wall of sound making it difficult to actually hear the tunes clearly. I enjoyed them the least of the night.

  Finally Master Blaster hit the stage, a four piece, with the vocalist being the non instrument playing member. Their set was full on punk energy, with the singer all over the place, knocking over mike stands and kicking over one of the monitor speakers before descending into the small audience, where he spent much of the rest of the gig screaming into his mic. They were bloody good and I enjoyed their set plenty but again the guitar was to low down in the mix and so didn't stand out above the thundering drums and bass so it was difficult to actually identify the songs I already knew because the whole was just a super fast wall of noise. It was a bit of a shame really because the guitarist has some great riffs as confirmed on the records. Here are a couple of vids of their recorded songs.