Surprisingly little information could be found online about Swedish punk outfit (D)juret (Lit. Trans. The Animal), and so gathering anything that may help add context to new release Sök Din Sekt (Lit. Search Your Sect), or the band in general, was difficult.
Sök Din Sekt is a three-track EP, which attempts to cross an entire spectrum of genres, but instead falls so far short in almost every aspect.
To begin with, let’s look at the runtime. An incredible 19 minutes, which, in all honesty, is 16 minutes too long. The essence of the three tracks that make up this EP could each be contained within 60 seconds (which may have made for a far better release), which leaves the remainder as just noise for the sake of it. Meaningless filler, that serves no purpose beyond padding out a runtime that could be better filled with, essentially, 16 more punk tracks of the punchy, fast and aggressive nature this genre has built its foundations upon.
Instead, track one ‘Mental Vinter’ (Lit. ‘Mental Winter) flutters between the previously aforementioned genre expectation, sandwiched between some questionable instrumental intro that even some post-rock new starts would find embarrassing, and a Viking-folk-esqe outro which bleeds into the second track in such a way you’ve no idea anything has changed. And that all sets the tone for the rest of the release.
The band sing in Swedish, and while my Swedish is, at best, patchy, that doesn’t matter, as it’s so muddy and unbalanced that it is almost impossible to make out the lyrics. As such, there is another layer of noise to negotiate through to find anything of meaningful worth.
And that’s all before the closing track. ‘Sök Din Sekt’ clocks in at just shy of 9 minutes. The same repeated hook played ad nauseam, before a nonsensical spoken word piece that just adds to the confusion, before mercifully ending with a game show-esqe theme and yet another spoken word rambling, and finally, the sweet release into silence.
So, to recap. My personal opinion of the EP is that it’s an absurd, frustrating and incoherent mess of conflicting ideas, lazy songwriting, poor production values and mismatched genres for which you will be expected to shell out £3 for the pleasure.
Loathed as I am to do so, I must award something. So for the fact that (D)juret have at least adhered to the physics of sound, and released a collection of notes and chords that vibrate and oscillate the pressure around my ears when played, which in turn form sound waves that, do in fact, create an audible noise I must award the lowest possible score I can.
