Pizzatramp – The Last Supper
(TNS Records)
LP | CD | DL available here
Out Now
The Last Supper could be the final album for skate thrash sarcastic punks Pizzatramp. Nathan Brown sings their praises.
Pizzatramp are hands down one of the funniest hardcore bands in the country. Fun sounds too lame a word for what they do. Razor sharp wit (okay, then, an ability to ad lib and swear lots which makes idiots like me guffaw) means their live sets are always full of “Did he just say that?” moments as they rename their songs to fit whatever is happening right there and then. Word on the street is the reason one festival I saw them at got banned from re-using their venue was purely because of the filth and drug references emanating from Jimmy’s polluted mouth. Perhaps my favourite moment was when they ridiculed some numbnut wearing a Nazi band t shirt at the Dean Lane Funday (a free hardcore punk festival in a Bristol skate park) who received the attention he so brutally deserved and quickly disappeared. “This one’s called don’t wear Nazi band t-shirts to a park full of anti-fascists” or something like that. He he. I should point out here that I am not glorifying violence, just violence against Nazis which is always glorious.
Another new Pizzatramp (or is it Pizza Tramp) record. This is good news. No, it’s great news. It is somewhat tinged with sadness, as the rumour is this is the last record. Here’s what TNS Records had to say about it: “The Last Supper will be their last album, and the band will end at some point in 2025. This had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Jim might die if the band carried on, and everything to do with the fact that final tours and albums can be lucrative.”
It’s quite a shrewd move, given that it took all the original members of the Ramones to die before they became High Street popular. Give it a couple of years and a Last Supper or Grand Relapse T shirt will be available in Primarni and some decrepit old punk will demand to know your favourite 3 songs, to which you will reply “This one’s called Why are old dudes so threatened by someone else liking their music, we won’t wear it out”. I won’t start listing all the bands who played their “last tour ever ever, honest guv” about 40 times but I sincerely hope Pizza Tramp do continue to play. If this is The Last Supper, and TNS are the Judas who betrayed them, I think it’s only fair that Pizzatramp should be crucified in the hope of everlasting resurrection so they live on forever, or at least to see them suffer. More Life of Brian than Son of God.
Anyway, always go and see Pizza Tramp if you like hardcore punk. If you like it fast and funny but with a dose of heavy in there then that’s even more reasons. For those of you old enough to remember The Stupids, imagine if they had thrown some Slayer riffs in and got Frankie Boyle to introduce their songs and you’re in the right ball park. I’m pretty sure this is what I said first time I saw them which was early doors for them back in March 2016 in Cardiff. I was an immediate convert, and I’m not alone at LTW. They’re one of Wayne AF Carey’s favourites after seeing them for the first time this year, and Neil Crud has gleefully played them on his LTW radio show. This is why they are Album Of The Week material.
Enough of this obituary for a band that’s not even dead! There is a risk here that I am misrepresenting the band. In among the puns and genuine mirth they also manage to point at things that are fucked up in this world. It’s just that they use humour, and use it well, which is a really accessible way of getting important shit into people’s brains.
The Pizzatramp sound is all about fast. Dan’s snare dominates the drums sound and cracks away with speed and power while and Sam’s bass and Jimmy’s guitar merge to form a wall of thrash. Jimmy’s vocals screech and shout with bile, sarcasm and the odd smirk.
Opener Armchair Activists Anonymous is an example of how Pizzatramp take away the rhetoric and provide a reality check. There is a refreshing brutal honesty recognising anyone with a full time job struggles to do anything outside of work long term before they burn out, they just get home and collapse in their chair/drug of choice.
“So don’t sound the alarms
This ain’t no call to arms
I just need Netflix today
Give me my chair and AAA”
The Last Supper tells the story of a vegan who decides that when it’s time to die, their duty to humanity would be to go cannibal and eat all the far right bastards ruining this planet. Clarkson, Farage, Andrew Tate, Putin, Murdoch, Katy Hopkins, Piers Morgan, they are all served up in various ways. You have to listen to it or read the full lyrics to get the full joy of this song. The coda “Broken bones and Toblerones” doesn’t just rhyme it also brings cannibalism, skateboarding and triangular food (?) together.
They slow down a little for Cop Fetish which is a slower, heavy and driving anti-cop song. Well, it’s supposed to be anti-cop after Jimmy was sussed out by one of his kids for watching too many cop shows. Finding any excuse to get arrested sounds more like cop love to me.
I Do My Own Research is a break neck charge with tight stops and starts that lines up far right conspiraloons for the next piss taking. The middle eight delivers the serious message behind the laughter.
“When suspicion of science leads to hatred and violence
When misplaced defiance leads to deadly alliance
When misinformation causes confusion
When statewide stagnation compounds the illusion”
Next up is probably my favourite track – Mr Slam – which even after repeated listens still makes me chuckle. It’s a brilliantly observed take down of tough guy hardcore, from the opening introduction, the mid-paced heavy riff and the monologue ending. “Peace”! Ridicule is the only sane response to people who take themselves too seriously. No need for me to say any more, just listen to the video below
I Spotify (With My Little Eye) is another barrelling rager that sounds like a steeplechase with the galloping snare occasionally taking an aural leap over the fences to hit cymbals. Does what it says on the tin. Spotify not welcome here. You Missed Billy Elliot And It Shows carries on at a similar speed. It’s about scabs crossing picket lines and the lack of working class organising rather than taking up ballet.
What Fresh Hell Is This? sees the band slow down for a mid-paced heavy head-nodding moment with guitar drop outs. They show their total understanding of the human condition and how the little things in life like broken lights and dripping taps can all add up to cause a complete meltdown. It’s this ability to understand the impact of the mundane as well as world wide horrors that makes Pizzatramp so relatable.
“It’s not the calamities in life
That push you to the edge
It’s single use passcodes
And now I’m on the ledge”
Again, with a title like Flagshaggers United, Pizzatramp don’t go for cryptic titles in the same way they don’t go for hidden meaning. Jimmy imitates a sports pundit reporting on Flagshaggers United playing their game before delivering the usual snarling message. The House That Jeff Built is another rager. The smug Jeff in question would be Bezos.
Skeletons is a well deserved slating of the Tories, and another fast number with a few stabs to liven things up. The liner notes explain that the song was 3 years old and recorded before the recent election. Following it is Bring Back Margaret Thatcher which slows down for some call response before getting back up to Warp Factor Pizzatramp. Far from being simplistic it draws on the impact of crypto-currency mining on the environment and compares it to fossil fuels and…you just need to read the band’s own notes on the song cos they were struggling to make sense of it too so I don’t have a hope.
The faux love song Zombies Have Feelings Too sounds bloody awful, which is clearly the intention as it’s a pastiche, but when the chorus kicks in and the zombie retches start, things look up. If Brian Adams wrote the theme for a George A Romero flick this is pretty much what you’d get. Finishing on a punch line, Pizzatramp sign off.
Get The Last Supper from TNS Records or download from bandcamp
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Words by Nathan Brown. His Louder Than War author archive can be found here.
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