Thirteen Shots album Black Smiles: B-horror movie theme wrapped in punk and garage blues

By Jason Michaelsen, Tampa Correspondent

Review of Black Smiles by Thirteen Shots (Undead Artists Records)

On June 29th the UK punk band Thirteen Shots released their new album, Black Smiles. Coming out of Birmingham, U.K., Johnny Rose leads the way with vocals, Lewis Manchip on the guitar, George Chick on the bass and Tom Fenn beating till his heart is content on the drums. These four musicians have put together a style all their own.

Now if you are just looking for a straight, hard core, angry-at-everything and nothing punk band, this is not it. Thirteen Shots has evolved this genre by taking several different styles and fusing them. Everything from 50’s rock to Garage Blues tied nicely together with B-horror movie lyrics. We all know this can be dangerous and a career ender if not done right—but they have successfully pulled it off.

With each song you are drawn in different directions with your head bobbing along for the ride. From the moment the opening song, titled ”Cobradeer” starts, it helps to prepare you for the carnival of controlled chaos we have come to expect from this group. As you continue across tracks, songs such as “Interlude” and “Lost Soul” have a slower tempo and almost feel as if they are from another band. The way they put all of this together with lyrics in which you can strongly hear the old black and white horror movie influences, shows you how versatile this group is as they keep evolving with each EP they put out.

My thoughts are if you haven’t already—you need to get this album. Every time I listen to each track I feel like I am glancing through a portal to the past and the future at the same time. I have a feeling that this is a group we will be hearing about for awhile and I look forward to hearing what the next stage in their evolution sounds like.