Capturing in the studio the energy of an electrifying live show has stymied so many new bands, but West Country fireballs Mother Vulture have managed to bottle their wild-eyed vitality on debut album Mother Knows Best.
That rotten title does them no favours, though. Its 12 tracks rush by in a blur of noise and nailed-on groove, while charisma-bomb frontman Georgi Valentine’s upper-register screech can strip paint and dislodge earwax at 50 feet.
It’s blues, it’s punk, it’s alt.rock, but it never feels like they’re trying to stick the head of a horse on the body of a camel. Fame Or Shame and the bonehead beat of Big Bad crackle like a 10,000-volt charge running through an uninsulated cable.
Yet while their desire to batter anyone who comes within 10 feet into submission is admirable, blockbusting choruses are in shorter supply – it’s perfect club fodder, but there’s nothing here that will get an arena crowd going. Solve that problem and then we’re talking.
