todd
Purity Pledge is Todd's full length debut and their first release for Southern. It kicks ass. Somehow, the band's incredible onstage verve and energy is captured and nailed into a forty minute-long assault on the senses. Todd are fuelled by more than the desire to act deranged and play powerchords - there's a restless intelligence at work, shown in the black humour forcefully delivered in those lyrics: "I write about prostitutes, drug-addicts, alcoholics, wife-beaters, all the typical rock 'n' roll shit... I don't know why I write about that stuff, just dark lyrics to suit the dark music, I guess. I'm not saying anything about myself, these are all characters." - Craig Clouse.
A whole range of influences can be picked out in the righteous wall of distortion. They owe a debt to Black Sabbath, but what decent rock band worth listening to doesn't? The thrift-store keyboards played by Clouse's wife Fifi and singer/percussionist Emmylou Sunshine, deliver the same relentless unease that you get from the first Suicide album. The no-wave, hardcore Jesus Lizard and Killdozer influences punch through in the menacing and insistent churning of John Webb and Craig Clouse's guitars. Drummer Francis Axe Handel binds the outfit tightly together.