Humour - Pure Misery

If shouty British post-punk can be thought of as a kind of musical Buckaroo, then with every new band adding its two cents to the teetering pile, the whole genre gets a little closer to that final snap. If you’re going to try and elbow your way into this most overpopulated of markets, then, you’d better have something different to say - and while, on paper, Glasgow’s Humour are offering up a familiar set of wares (slicing guitars, vocals that take a liberal approach to the term ‘singing’), on ‘Pure Misery’’s best moments the quartet do bring something new to the table. Opener ‘yeah, mud!’ has a silliness to it that nods to ‘90s oddballs Sultans of Ping F.C, while the EP’s title track is yelped out with such frenzied insanity, you’ve got to give frontman Andreas Christodoulidis his dues for really committing to the bit. ‘jeans’’ howling delivery and ominous stalk have more in common with Viagra Boys than their UK peers, however on dirgey previous single ‘alive and well’, they lose some of that personality, only really harnessing the energy again in a crescendoing final third. Same goes for closer ‘good boys remember well’, which musically feels like it could have been left on Fontaines DC’s cutting room floor. Still, far from the despair of its title, ‘Pure Misery’ has lots in it to love - even more so when Humour go all out and stand firm in their own lane.