(Festival Mushroom)

After two years of waiting patiently for the follow up to 2001’s ‘When Young Terrorists Chase The Sun’, Gerling fans should be thrilled that their thunderous return with BadBlood!!!

After their emergence on the Australian scene almost 10 years ago, we have watched Gerling experiment their way to excellence as they fused noisy guitars, beats, synths, vocoders and screaming, collaborating with the likes of Ms ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head’, Josh Abrahams, Kool Keith and Solex as they became known as one of the most exciting and innovative bands on the Australian scene, perched high on the fence between commercial success and the indie kids they are at heart, there is no stopping Gerling!

Moving away from the obvious commercially aimed tracks that appeared on WYTCTS (a la Dust Me Selecta, The G-House Project etc), BadBlood!!! sees the wacky Sydney trio dipping their hand into the increasingly popular electro clash, disco punk bucket to fill their hands with both dirt and glitter to throw our way.

The tracks are boisterous but inviting, not to over produced, which is a relief after WYTCTS, as we didn’t quite know which way they were going to take things from there. BadBlood!!! is more indicative of their capricious live shows, danceable, loud, catchy, energetic and easy to digest, it’s a record that will go down well in clubs or to help liven up a party, even a good driving record, but one rule remains, it has to be up loud!

Featuring the sleazy slice of trashy disco punk ‘Who’s Ya Daddy?’, ‘Get Activated’, a fantastic Strokes-esque ‘In The City’ – who would have thought, but it’s pulled off damn well, next single perhaps? Other highlights include ‘Blood on The Microphone part 1’, ‘Smash The Emergency Glass’ and title track ‘Bad Blood!!!’

Clocking in at just under the 38 minute mark, this album is a neatly packaged highlight, – you won¹t find your finger finding the digit to skip any tracks on this record. Digging their guitars out of the studio corner they’ve been slumped in for so long and eradicating the rats who’ve taken up residence in their amps to mix old skool Gerling with Gerling 2003, they’ve never sounded better!