STARCRAWLER - Starcrawler

If you want to get a sense of the post-adolescent, tongue-in-cheek spirit animating Starcrawler, just take a look at the video for “I Love L.A.”, shot with the band playing staff at a surreal American fast-food joint, or the horror-tinged staging put together to promote “Let Her Be”.

The four Californians, barely out of their teens and already signed to Rough Trade, blast through ten tracks on this self-titled debut produced by Ryan Adams, material that crackles by skillfully crossing Hole and T. Rex, the '90s and the '70s, grunge and glam, somewhere between guitar nostalgia and well-worn rockstar poses.

She, Arrow De Wilde, voice and personality to spare, is blonde and skinny as a rail; he, Henri Cash, voice and guitar, already has just the right charisma: if for you six strings still represent the true essence of rock'n'roll, this will be the best possible debut of early 2018. The web of references is extremely rich: “Chicken Woman” speaks the language of Sabbath-indebted hard rock, complete with a surprise acceleration in the finale, “Pussy Tower” is Mark Bolan in pure form, and elsewhere they land somewhere between the Runaways and the riffs of early Queens Of The Stone Age.

At their most effective when they keep tracks under two minutes (the Nirvana-esque “Full Of Pride”, the sharp-edged bullets “Train” and “Different Angles”), Starcrawler don't lose momentum even when they stretch the running time a little. The band represent the new incarnation of the classic-glam spirit, simple yet thoroughly modern, and by the end they find the strength to craft a dense electric ballad (“Tears”) and to take on the acid blues that made the White Stripes great at the turn of the millennium (“What I Want”).

Immediately booked for the 2018 edition of the Primavera Sound in Barcelona to spice up the opening day, live they prove they have all the energy needed to bring down the walls of any live club, as shown by the videos circulating on YouTube. Case in point: the blistering "Ants", last year's single left off the album for who knows what reason, or the entire show (viewable alongside this article) held at the Omeara Club in London on January 18th. Excitement levels off the charts: don't miss out, folks, take our word for it.

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01/01/2018