Motor City Mayhem “Shitfaced and Outta Luck”

Sometimes we wonder if a full review is needed for an album. Let’s be honest, this bands name, the album title and the spelling of ‘out of’ should be enough to let you know if you’re going to like this or not. It suggests high octane punk rock and that’s sure as hell good enough for us.
Not surprisingly, this album comes blasting right at you from the off. Opening track “Hey C’mon” is a blistering punk rock number. Together with “The Road” and “Bad Friends” it reminds us of the first time we heard Backyard Babies’ seminal album “Total 13”. It has that same kind of ‘sonic’ edge and feel to it. Tracks like “Dead City” are effectively punk metal tracks but sound unbelievably fresh.

This is really in your face punk rock, numbers like “When We Were Kings” pay their dues to all the greats, including Backyard Babies, Hellacopters, The Black Haloes and even the harder sleaze metal acts like Guns N Roses and Motley Crue. In the days when those bands were hitting the strip then songs like “Bad Habit” and “Psycho Ward” would have made Motor City Mayhem huge. Even better, the harmonica on “Burn In Hell” has us reminiscing about the kings of that genre, Hanoi Rocks.
This is just a great sleaze rock album, the kind that we thought bands had forgotten how to make these days. Anyone who recognises the bands in this review will absolutely love this kind of in your face punk n roll. What Motor City Mayhem need to do now is find some other bands capable of delivering this kind of sleaze rock n roll and get a ‘scene’ together. Maybe then we can see some good old rock n roll grabbing the mainstream by the balls again!!