ALBUM REVIEW: Tough Crowd – Nervus

Such is NERVUS‘ outspoken, often empowering refusal to keep their opinions to themselves, that their music can often seem secondary. Making their thoughts known on everything from LGBTQ+ rights to society as a whole – they’re a beacon of hope for many, a walking embodiment of what punk has always been, but packaged together with modern values. As the dawn rises on the next chapter in the career of the DIY punks, it’s the devastation of the worlds environmental, and societal state that finds itself in the bands cross hairs. It’s yet another example that the strength of the quartets stance could potentially put their musical etchings on the backseat, but whether you find solace in the values of new record Tough Crowd or not: this is an inescapably glistening punk rock album.

The rampant tempo of Piss is everything you’d want from a band of this ilk, and The Inconvenient Truth‘s bouncy, summer-time jam flamboyancy is a fascinating juxtaposition against the sincerity of its lyrics. It’s this ability to take complex, distressing matters and dress them up within the walls of singalong punk rock that has always made NERVUS a force to be reckoned with. But here more than ever – the band have an anthemic twist around every corner.

Even more sombre affairs such as Engulf You have an unmissable charm you can’t help but get hooked by, and everything present on Tough Crowd is tied together beautifully by producer Neil Kennedy. His brilliance from working with the likes of MILK TEETH and CREEPER has been effortlessly translated here, and NERVUS‘ bold step to climb outside of the intimate, but claustrophobic walls of each other’s bedroom for production and into the hands of a studio pays off in dividends throughout the record.

Despite NERVUS already existing as one of the most important, revered bands at the forefront of the DIY punk scene pretty much since their inception – their leap into the unknowns of a studio gives them a sheen they never quite had before. The titanic chorus of I Can’t Dance just wouldn’t sound as alluring without Kennedy‘s sonic balancing, and if anyone was concerned that the Watford quartet would lose their charisma when removed from their pre-acclimatised setting, the first 30 seconds of the wonderfully extrovert No Nations should squash any fears.

NERVUS have already been a punk game changer in many ways, and there are sections of society which will proudly look back on the band as a four piece that, if nothing else: always remained true to themselves. But Tough Crowd is arguably their biggest musical statement yet, strip this record down to its skin and bones and you’d still find punk rock in all its glory. This is a record that finds a band reaching creative maturity, without losing an inch of what kick started their journey in the first place.

Rating: 8/10

Tough Crowd is out now via Big Scary Monsters. 

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