Published on May 19, 2020
Though you may have never heard of San Francisco's Re-Volts before, if you've been spinning punk records anytime recently, you've probably come across bands like Me First And The Gimme Gimmes, Swingin' Utters, Dead To Me, The Sore Thumbs, and One Man Army, all of which share members of Re-Volts. Self-described as rock 'n' roll, their collective punk rock experience comes together on this very catchy EP – the third they released in 2019.
“Leeches” starts the listen with some throwback rock 'n' roll swagger that's full of all things that we love about the genre, i.e. soaring melody, anthemic choruses and an energetic rhythm section that touches on garage rock influences. The addition of a horn makes the opener that much more enjoyable, too.
The band continues the party with the upbeat and flowing sounds of “Metropolis Or Bust,” where frontman Spike Slawson's vocals are extremely melodic as the music follows suit with an approach that touches on the early days of punk and even brings in keys. Meanwhile “Love Letters” is a short blast of nostalgic pop fun. A classic cover, something that Slawson is intimately familiar with, Re-Volts put their punk influenced spin on the timeless tune like few other have or could.
Re-Volts has actually existed since 2007, though with the members commitments to other bands there have been long breaks of inactivity. 2019 was an extremely prolific year for the all-star ensemble, although an LP is unfortunately not available despite the demand.
Limited to just 500 and on beer color with red splatter vinyl, I'm quite surprised to see that there's any copies left of Leeches, as this is some of the best punk rock to come out of the Bay Area in recent history, which, if you're familiar with the legions of seminal punk bands from the area, is very high praise.