Penetrode emerges from Philadelphia with a powerhouse debut LP. Dramatic, intense and precisely played hardcore punk! Penetrode oozes attitude in a way most contemporary bands can only aspire to.

First full-length release from these Philly hardcore freaks. The more I listen to this, the more I like it. While all rooted in noisy, dark hardcore, the songs are all very distinct from each other and occasionally go from fast punk to slow dirges, like on “Psychic Death.” There are some sonic similarities to bands like GAG and NERVOSAS, but the real stand-out here is vocalist/artist Bootsie. The vocals go from sung to shrieked to spoken and back again, with a distinctive yelp at the end of many lines. They’re great and sound confident, passionate, and exciting. Every song is a banger, but I keep going back to “Ebb & Flow.” It’s got layers of negative bummer punk distortion with a catchy opening riff, time changes, dissonant vocals, and lyrics like (I think), “Pick me up and spit me out.” It’s basically everything I want in a punk song. Check it out—this is a killer tape from a killer band.


Our take: The last time we heard from Philadelphia’s Penetrode was back in 2017, when they released a split 7” with Chicago’s C.H.E.W. That was a great pairing, bringing together two intense and inventive bands with top-notch musicianship, and while C.H.E.W. is sadly no more, the intervening five years have apparently done little to soften Penetrode’s rough edges. The overall tone of this record is dark, murky, and uncomfortable, but the thing I focus on most is the playing. Penetrode is so locked in that they can execute the lunging rhythmic acrobatics I associate with Bl’ast! or Damaged-era Black Flag. You hear this on tracks like “Delusion” and “Past.Future.Present,” which sound a lot like Bl’ast!, but that locked-in way of playing also shapes songs like the dirge-y, mid-paced “Psychic Death” and the manic instrumental “Penetrode.” The riffing is great throughout the record, catchy, powerful, and inventive, often squeezing complex, dissonant chords into nimble runs. The grimy production and the muffled, low-in-the-mix vocals are straight out of the Bl’ast! playbook too, and as with that band it can make it a little tougher to wrap your ear around this record on the first listen. However, once you lock in, the murk perfectly encapsulates the music’s dark and desperate vibes. Highly recommended for those of you who like your hardcore dark, moody, and complex.