The Judex, a rock n’ roll band out of Philadelphia, has just released a double A-Side single. It’s their only release so far, but it’s apparent after listening to it that these guys are focused on quality. My first thought while listening to the track “Witchface,” was that this music reminds me a lot of the kind of punk rock that you’d hear in 80s horror movies like Return of the Living Dead. The recording has that polished, 1980’s analog engineer professionalism that you just don’t hear anymore. It’s the sound of musical and recording pros that know what they’re doing. Mark Plati did a fantastic job mixing/mastering this and capturing the ambiance the band was going for perfectly. There are no corners being cut here.
The guitar work on here is incredible and the singer can really sing. You can’t really fake it with this kind of music. One of the reasons a lot of the bands from the 70’s and 80’s resented the grunge and “alternative” music of the 90’s was because a lot of the bands were not very good technically. For example, when I was a kid, people would often have debates over “who was the better guitar player” or “who is the better drummer” in popular punk or metal bands. In the 90s though, people never cared or talked about that stuff anymore. They just talked about personality or “meaning.” The Judex marks a return to the tradition of well crafted songwriting and superb technical execution in indie rock’n’roll. They have a new EP coming out in August. I recommend you check it out, because they are legit.