War On Women – Wonderful Hell – album review

War On Women – Wonderful Hell

Bridge Nine Records

LP – CD – DL

Out Now

War On Women is a co-ed feminist hardcore-punk band. Formed in Baltimore, MD in 2011. They just released their new album, they see it as ‘a call to action, even when every step forward feels like it’s met with a landslide back.’ They say that this is for like minded people to ‘ultimately challenge them to find their inner strength and build the world they want to live in rather than burn down what’s left of this one.’ A hard angry record. Fighting Boredom have been listening, read what we think below.

The last War on Women album came out as Trump had taken office, it was a furious white hot blast of anger captured in the spirit of US hard core. Two years later and Trump is hanging onto the Whitehouse door frame by his finger nails, explosive events have galvanised feminist, race and ecology movements around the world and a global pandemic is infecting and killing people without prejudice. This album reacts to this melting pot of change and it’s overriding attitude is to keep fighting, keep going and raise hell.

The sound is volatile, still angry and confrontational. It is beyond doubt punk but has moved on from any imagined hardcore limitations, there’s the swagger and swing of L7, the slabs of noise from the likes of Big Black and fuzzy stuttering massive guitars. The noise is righteous and razor sharp, the vocals angry and focused in like a laser. 

The last time I reviewed War on Women I said that I wanted to see them live, experience the sweat and power in a performance that I was sure would blow the record away, good as it was. This time I need the live experience even more. Most of us haven’t seen live music for months and may not for months yet. But when I can, I want to feel these sounds of righteous anger and power in a dark room with people who need it as much as me.

This is a political record, an angry and aggrieved record, but it’s also about not giving up, about5 forging on, about resisting and fighting, it’s about raising some beautiful, wonderful hell.

War On Women are on Bandcamp, they are on Facebook and Tweet as @WarOnWomxn

All words by Adrian Bloxham.

Adrian Bloxham

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *