Review: Pop Will Eat Itself – 'Watch The Bitch Blow' EP

POP WILL EAT ITSELF
'Watch The Bitch Blow'
PLEDGEMUSIC 

After the surprisingly return of PWEI in 2011 with 'New music designed by a sadist' the Midlands based industrial crew return with their eagerly anticipated 'Watch The Bitch Blow' EP.

It seems to have been a very busy year for the band this year, with the hopes of a new album out by Autumn and even an un-official FIFA single to go up against Gary Barlow. This EP plays as a pre-cursor and is also raising money for the rest of the years' endeavours via Pledgemusic.

Although promoting themselves as the "New Look PWEI", the group have come back strong, shaking off the 'demo-like' former album and have seemed to have picked off where 'Dos Dedos...' left off. The title track is a perfect come back to the band's old style, with a little modern touch from dubstep drum styling that for once doesn't seem to overtake the song. As well as that the vocals really give you a feeling that the band have gone back to their activist roots, although it's content about the 99% movement is a little out of date, but we'll forgive them this time.

The next tracks 'Hollow' and 'Babylon R.I.P' are re-hashes of old tracks that were done at the time of the bands' break up back in 1995. 'Hollow' has a more eerie gritty vibe that seems more late 90's Industrial than what they are used to playing. It's a fitting change of pace from the former track and is sure to be a live favourite. 'Babylon R.I.P' has had a long trip. Starting as an ambient outro to 'Dos Dedos...' the band then re-worked it for the special edition version released last year, only to be again disappointed by it's outcome. This final take has been nearly ten years in the making and seems to not really make any waves. It's good to hear today's producing techniques turn it into something new, but it's still very laid back.

The last three tracks are remixes, and in true PWEI style they come in three different sounds.  The remix of 'MASK' is a typical re-working that you could play in a club and people wouldn't notice much of a difference, but it has a groove vibe that any fan of the alt genre would enjoy. As remixes go it seems a little dated (it wouldn't stand out of the 'Two Fingers...' album that's for sure) but in a genre that's being besieged by hardstyle and dubstep re-hashes it's a slight relief to hear something we can all relate to and enjoy.'Every Day Is A World War's remix is more of a 90's mix that you may find on an Apollo 440 b-side. You can have it on in the background but it's not much good for anything else. 'Wasted (Part 2)' is a follow up to the outro track on '...Sadist' and is a true spirit of Dub. It's great to see that PWEI haven't fallen into the traps of modern Industrial acts and gone down the lazy dance route of remixes and stayed where their sounds work best.

Posted in: music,Pop Will Eat Itself,Watch The Bitch Blow