In Rotation: Blystex - Nasty Licks

Phil Collins - July 25, 2017

Nasty Licks

Blystex offer shouty vocals with Spanish lyrics over fuzzy guitar riffs on their new EP Nasty Licks. The Chicago band run through six songs in concise fashion. This release is to the point in length and from what I can tell as someone who doesn't speak much Spanish, it seems to be to the point lyrically as well. "Peligroso" opens up the EP with the refrain "No me toques," or "Don't touch me." I like hearing lyrics in other languages because it does put forward a different sound than what we are used to hearing with so many bands singing in English. Other languages have different sentence structures and different ways of pronouncing letters, so there is an inherently distinct sound versus what you would get with English lyrics. It is also important to have bands singing in Spanish right now given the political rhetoric being thrown around on a constant basis these days.

I recently talked about this EP, along with many other recent local punk releases, on an Album Review Roundtable episode of the Friskie Morris Sessions podcast. Adam Kreutzer of The Kreutzer Sonata and Nic Campa of Oscar Bait and Otto Mann were also guests on the episode. Listen to that here. I mentioned during the Blystex segment that this band would be perfect to see in a basement doing a 20 minute set, to which Adam reminded me that we had seen them do just that earlier in the summer. The old memory just isn't what it used to be. In any case, check out this EP. Foreign Legion Records did a limited cassette run for Nasty Licks, which is already sold out.

Blystex play a Fed Up Fest aftershow at Minx Mansion on Friday with Elix-R and Plastic. More information on that show here. Stream Nasty Licks below.