Pressure Pin is a project that essentially came out of nowhere, from one Kenny Smith, the drummer of the new disco-art punk group La Sécurité. As Pressure Pin, his debut EP, Superficial Feature, is a four-song practice of art-punk and post-hardcore new wave and it’s frenetically mesmerizing. It’s a bit Squid and New Fries and I was hooked right as the weird pitch guitar and thick bass picked up on the opening track “A New Movie.” The switch between the almost depressing robotic vocals and hysterical screams is lightning in a bottle.
The mixing is also fantastic with a cacophony of horns under scratchy chugging guitars. The vocals also come off as public advisory statements as in “Complete Impulse Directive,” where Smith categorizes exactly what is wrong with society, rhyming in prose that seems like a pure stream of consciousness with a surreal agitated edge. And the brief pauses between vocal takes are chaotic in the best ways possible.
There are so many sounds to grab on to in the last track “Limited Movement” which almost seems like a satire on specific music genres it deems fit. The guitars are deranged and I can’t decipher what’s really going on at points, but that’s the point. I’m ensnared in this trap Pressure Pin has created.
Like all well-crafted EPs, Superficial Feature left me wanting more songs from Pressure Pin. Either way, it will be one I throw on when I want to feel weirdly inspired.
Personally, I’m ready for this new wave of exciting and bat shit art-punk coming from Montreal, and hopefully Pressure Pin will continue to be a project in the ranks.
