Sister Switchblade

One of the things I like about running a webzine like decibelROGUE is you never really know what’s around the next corner. So when one of our friends pointed us in the direction of Perth-based hard rock outfit Sister Switchblade, I thought that it’d be good to add another relatively local band to our list of contacts. In actual fact it wasn’t the Perth that’s a 40min drive from decibelROGUE HQ he was talking about, but the one that’s slightly further away – in Western Australia! Thankfully we live in a world of interwebs and email, so the band’s founder Andy Smith was kind enough to send us an electronic copy of their debut album Best Served Cold.

The modern means by which I got my hands on the album is at complete odds with the distinctly old school nature of the songs within it. Think early Mötley Crüe and the like, and you’ll get the idea.

Opening three tracks Twenty Three Sins, Back To Babylon and Come Midnight kick the album off in properly no-nonsense guitar-crunching style. But underpinning the huge riffs and searing guitar solos in these songs are really good melodies. So even just three songs in, you instinctively know that Best Served Cold isn’t gonna be one of those albums which will need a second or third listen to really hook into. This makes listening to the rest of the album really enjoyable.

So, when Best Served Cold is powering along on a wave of huge riffs and rock ‘n’ roll attitude, it’s a very good rock album indeed. Which brings me to the three ballads on the record. Each one of them (Sleeping With Snakes in particular) are good songs in their own right. But squeezing 3 ballads into an 11 track rock album kinda kills the momentum every time it’s just getting into it’s stride. This is a (very) minor niggle though.

Highlight of the album for me is Back To Babylon. It’s probably the heaviest track on the record and has a very old school British hard rock vibe about it. Add into the mix a little Black Album-era Metallica about some of the vocal arrangements and you have one of those songs which would get any mosh pit bouncing.

If you like your rock music of the no-nonsense variety, you really should check out Best Served Cold. No word whether Sister Switchblade will be touring any time soon, but we hope they’ll be heading our way before too long.

Tracklist
1  Twenty Three Sins
2  Back To Babylon
3  Come Midnight
4  Breathe
5  Downtown
6  No Enemies
7  Sleeping With Snakes
8  Sweet Venus Salvation
9  Ground Zero
10  My Midnight Monkey
11  Sister Switchblade

Links
You can follow Sister Switchblade on Facebook HERE
You can buy a copy of Best Served Cold HERE