Violent Reaction: Marching On (2015) Review – You Might Lose Your Mind

It is good for my scatter brained self to digest an album like Marching On by Violent Reaction. The spirit of punk has always been one of sporting songs that speed along at a quicker pace than other music genres. It certainly helps with my high-strung personality to relax to something as sporadic as my own mind, much referred to that dog in the movie Up. I mean, just listen to “Death Threat” and tell me it does not disseminate your thoughts between chord progressions and drums, feeling like they are flying all over the place. Is that not the best part of punk? Losing your mind (or in this case tossing it aside) and giving in to the need to spaz out with energetic music.

Order Marching On here.

Regardless, enough rambling, I could probably write a few more paragraphs in detail about the genre Violent Reaction play in, but then the album would be over. Clocking in at 19 minuters, Marching On is anthemic and bleeds classic punk style riffs with hectic drums and raw vocals. While not being as harsh as other acts, the vocals breathe life into the project, which is kind of contradictory to say because at times I really wonder if Tom Pimlott actually is breathing while he spews his frantic lines, like on “Bored To Death.”

This band can pull of melody too, well at least once. Opening track “M1 Stomp” is a complete instrumental with chugged riffs and a bellowing bass to set the mood about the onslaught of blast beats that may or may not occur later (to be accurate, they occur frequently, and even within the same track). “Direct Action” opens with an absolutely insane drum line that quickly devolves into a two step before ADHD kicks in with spontaneous rolls and rolls, killing the entire need for a groove at all.

If you come into the punk world looking for mellow tracks, often times you will be displaced by what actually occurs. The energy in this album, however, releases Dopamine to my starving brain and creates synapses that then send signals to my limbs, telling me to get off my ass and loose myself in the endless circle pits.

Stream Marching On here.

The Verdict:

The spirit of punk is alive and well in Marching On. In 20 minutes you could probably build up enough of a sweat and work out to this album to finally fill that New Years Resolution, or whatever it is people call "diets" these days.