Wild Flag pulls in members of The Minders, Sleater-Kinney and Quasi, Autoclave and Helium, and with pedigree like that you can guess what you’re going to be in for. Press play on their eponymous debut and you’re thrown straight into thumping, yelping, skewed post-punk. ‘Wild Flag’ has all the rolling drums, wobbly synths and handclaps you could ask for, and throws in vocals and guitar riffs that sound like they were written with the simple but sincere purpose of being really, really fun.

Songs like ‘Boom’ and ‘Future Crimes’ use brilliantly solid drumming as a base for guitars that slide in from all angles (almost seeming to surprise themselves) while the vocals spray out in clipped consonants and swallowed vowels. Admittedly, it’s not covering much ground that hasn’t been covered before, notably by the members’ previous bands, but if you want to hear music that sounds like this then you aren’t going to hear it better anywhere else.

If we had to, I mean HAD to criticise, we’d say they could have pushed the format a bit; tracks ‘Glass Tambourine’ and ‘Endless Talk’ are touching on shoegazing or even C86 territory and as such stand out among the more straightforward lo-fi rock tunes; but they’re just a brief change of pace and aren’t really expanded on or referenced later. This is really just a matter of personal taste though, and for what it is, we don’t feel the album is missing anything.

There’s warmth and joy in ‘Wild Flag’ that clearly comes from the band doing exactly what they want, and as with all albums that look inward rather than outward, it’s probably going to hit and miss people in equal numbers. But if you like this sort of thing, then this is the sort of thing you’re going to love. We do.

-Toby Dore-