Eddy Current Suppression Ring
Primary Colours
(Goner Records)

Where is the great land of punk rock? England? No. America? No. How about Australia? This is an argument that can be plausibly made. Take the first-wave acts like the Saints and Radio Birdman, then the Scientists and the Birthday Party, and now Eddy Current Suppression Ring. Primary Colours, the second album from this young Oz quartet, trades in a nervy, jagged, lo-fi, in-the-red punk with just enough of an infectious and poppy flair. Borrowing from the Modern Lovers, Wire, and Buzzcocks, songs like the infectious “Wrapped Up” and the blazing “Which Way to Go” have the youthful punch and off-the-cuff charge of the more recent and the initial records by the Strokes and Arctic Monkeys. Put it on the shoulders of the exuberant, half-spoken, half-sung delivery of singer Brendan Suppression and the wiggy but angular guitar aesthetic of the band’s titular guitarist Eddy Current, though no question the unwavering rhythm section of Rob Solid (bass) and Danny Current (drums) hold their own. Fun, fast, and fired up, there isn’t a down moment here across 10 tracks.

—donny kutzbach