LimeWire Music Blog

Zounds were part of England’s late-’70s/early-’80s anarcho-punk scene; friends of Crass, they released their debut EP on the latter’s label. Though they released a number of EPs and singles, they only managed to put out one full-length album, The Curse of Zounds, before disbanding in 1982. This collection includes everything the band ever recorded, not only the album but all the EP tracks and singles as well. What becomes immediately apparent is Zounds’ musicality; while they were just as musically and politically uncompromising as Crass, et al., they had a lot more sonic strings to their bow than your average first-generation anarcho-punk outfit. “More Trouble Coming Every Day,” for example, is a full-on power-pop tune, complete with backing-vocal harmonies and melodic bass lines, while “True Love” and “Demystification” show a marked tendency toward ’60s garage psychedelia, sporting organ riffs straight out of Nuggets territory. Sure, there are plenty of tough, taut punk tunes here, but even at their punkiest, Zounds displayed a tightness that suggested they could have continued to grow if they had stayed together longer.