Fight Like Apes And The Mystery Of The Golden Medallion

As backyards go, Fight Like Apes’ is strewn with expectation. Their country’s greatest and whitest hopes since Whipping Boy, the Dublin-based four-piece’s mouthful of a debut - Fight Like Apes And The Mystery Of The Golden Medallion - is arguably the most eagerly anticipated Irish release of the decade. The dynamic, sexy and noisy quartet, led by the fiercely charismatic and show-stealing leading lady Maykay, have progressed from blog darlings to The Ting Tings UK tour mates, raising anticipation far and beyond. And for three-quarters of their long-playing bow, they live up the billing with unnerving poise.

In fact you’ll be hard pushed to find a more thrilling opening to a record, debut or no debut, this year. Running the gauntlet expertly between the fantastically daft (‘Jake Summers‘) and the frenetically ball-crushing (‘Digifucker‘), …The Golden Medallion‘s more familiar first half is a total riot. The remaining recognizable tracks from the bands previously fawned-over EP’s - ‘Lend Me Your Face’, ‘Do You Karate’, ‘Battlestations’ - are equally exquisitely reworked by producer John Goodmanson (Los Campesinos, Sleater-Kinney, Blood Brothers). There’s a new paintjob performed on all to be sure, but it’s slapped on with no desire for a clean finish. The bands rougher, synth-attacking Bikini Kill/McCluskey/Devo edges still remain, on the whole, untouched.

That’s until a quite puzzling finale. ’Megameanie’, an eight second burst of an eighth track, acts as an unwitting buffer to a momentum-crushing wind down. Proceeding track apart - the sublimely titled waltz ‘I’m Beginning To Think You Prefer Beverly Hills 90210 To Me’ is possibly the album’s finest - the equally aptly titled ‘Lumpy Dough’, ’Recyclable Ass’ and ’Snore Bore Whore’ grind …The Golden Medallion to an unsatisfactory halt. The first of the trio sounds far too much like Linkin Park for its own good while the last is desperately overlong (’Recyclable Ass’ is ok to be fair). But what’s galling is the riotous girl who screamed “and did you fuck her and did you stick things up her” six tracks earlier inexplicably disappears into her shell and it’s an uncomfortable, frustrating and underwhelming fit.

Shave ‘em off and you’d likely have yourself a nailed-on classic debut. Leave as they did and you’ve still got one of the most impressive introductions of the year.