Have you ever felt life was becoming too bland? Too black and white? Too muddled in misunderstood messes of politics and monotony? Have you or a loved one been diagnosed with having no personality?

Call Sweet Jonny now!

The debut, and by debut I mean the first release longer than an EP, self-titled from Burgess Hill’s Sweet Jonny is saturated in fundamental garage rock with properly placed proto-punk sneer. The twelve runaway tracks lay down a highway of energy and presence that is just what the doctor ordered. Dirge riddle melodic pairings pop up between the teeth-baring attitudes we’ve come to appreciate from Sweet Jonny EPs past.  Yet to expand on the distortion grinding personality of Tom Backshall (vocals/guitar), Jonny Pinder (drums), and Tom Jenn (bass) the debut somehow captures the energy and excitement one would hope to experience at a live show with ample amounts of f**k all. Granted, this would only begin to scratch the surface of what a live Sweet Jonny presumably is, it does quickly become a great excuse to just unleash your inner garage punk and rock out wherever the moment finds you.

Let’s be honest, there are plenty of people out there parading the flag of punk or garage rock under the banner of notable influences, but Sweet Jonny does not feign their existence, they are the real deal. Frankly, they wouldn’t give two shits if you cared or not. That only plays into our hands as the listener. The working man’s rock style is palatable to the novice and highly consumable to the connoisseur. Hints of glory-day punk thrive in Sweet Jonny while carving out a place for its own. In this vein it seems counter-intuitive to even make such statements of this style, but a sound like that which Backshall, Jenn, and Pinder have molded is a brilliant stroke in a world being spray painted in beige. Except instead of rainbows and vivid imagination, there’s a middle finger and an anthem.

Greg is a co-founder and regular contributor of Nanobot Rock.