Ahhh, nothing puts me in a better mood than some good old hate-spewing, snotty-as-hell degenerate punk rock and the Hot LZ’s totally bring the goods! ‘Aggravate My Mind’ is the new LP from Portland’s the Hot LZ’s and it’s fucking great! These guys take me back to the glory days of the ’90s punk rock n’ roll scene and that’s not by accident. Singer/guitarist Mark Death was a major player during that time period as a member of The Halfways and before forming the Moneychangers in the early 2000’s. And like his contemporaries Scott Deluxe Drake and Larry May, he’s still killing it in the new millenium with the Hot LZ’s! The fact that ‘Aggravate My Mind’ is out on a label called Hate Street Records pretty much tells you everything you need to know about this record. You know how some bands write almost nothing but love songs? Well these guys write almost nothing but hate songs, and I don’t think I could ever tire of hearing Mr. Death rail against everyone and everything that pisses him off. He’s a bad-ass guitar player with tuff burly leads on almost every song and an equally aggro front man snearing in the vein of Stiv Bators with a little Metal Mike bite. On ’Aggravate My Mind’, The Hot LZ’s show their amped up strains of Cleveland/New York in the late 70’s firing off 12 loud and proud hate anthems boasting a healthy injection of the Dead Boys, New York Dolls, Stooges and the Pagans with lyrics delivered so scathingly pissed off. Fans of any of the aforementioned bands or newer gutter chic rockers like the Lovesores, Jonesy and the Hip Priests will be all over this.
Released by Hate Street Records (2016).
