There are many cheap shortcuts to define Brooklyn’s Punks On Mars‘ latest EP, Hey! Tiffany, but no short way to get it right. First, referencing, to lay a base. A glittery touch of 70s proto-punk, topped with a fusing 80’s power-pop sound and its high-pitched prominent guitars, a few Ramones beats…that’s a start. Then, analogies. Even easier! Cartoon-esque atmospheres, padded bubbles, chipmunks on psychedelics and bad trips at the fun fair, get it? Finally, oxymorons and other contradictions. Hyperglycaemic punk, oppressively pop, carefully produced as a satyrical take on a lo-fi frenzy, seemingly unmastered sharp fuzz…it’s at once any critic’s dream playground and worst nightmare! You’ll want to decorticate, reveal a form of institutional critique, yet you’ll refrain from being that guy, the enemy, the downer. You’ll then be tempted to stick to the fun side but can palp the two thirds of the iceberg lying beneath the colourful surface… it’s a tricky one! Ultimately, it may be best to admit any label to be reductive, and see that it may precisely be a clever distortion of many familiar patterns that set front man Ryan Howe’s catchy sound right on the edge of any mainstream, thus defining it as unique in its genre(s)- whatever it may resemble! – Tracy Mamoun
