BLAC BLOCS

Mandala

radicalhack.com/blacblocs/

‘Blac Blocs are fucking dead,’ declare the liners of this, the Perth band’s second and final album. It’s a clear allusion to Refused, of course, with whom they share an anarchic, activist outlook.

But there the comparisons rest. Where the legendary Swedes were verbose, Blac Blocs are concise. And where Refused tranced out and then smashed through it with face-melting metalcore, Blac Blocs sound perpetually stoned… sort of like if The Birthday Party had been dumped in the desert and forced to walk to Perth.
And while the lyrics repeatedly reference being ‘…down at the barricades,’ there’s no hint of naïve aggression. Mandala is no Rage Against The Machine; no call to arms.
Indeed, it’s wiser – a realist document that is deceptively jaunty and… actually kinda happy. ‘Dance / on the car tops / for your freedom,’ Allan Boyd yelps before declaring ‘if we bow down to their capsicum spray / we will never be free.’
If the revolution comes, the Blac Blocs dudes will definitely be there, and happily, this album presents that steadfast worldview without being too preachy.

_BEN WATSON