San Francisco’s Spiritual Cramp make nervous, urgent, wiry punk rock, and they’re extremely good at it. For the past few years, the band has been silent, but if you’ve seen their live-in-studio cover of the Hives “Walk Idiot Walk” — recorded for last year’s Save Stereogum Zoom party and recently shared with the rest of the world — then you know that they’ve kept their knives sharp. Today, Spiritual Cramp finally return with their Here Comes More Bad News EP, their first new music in three years.
Here Comes More Bad News is a short record — four songs in about nine minutes — but it’s also evidence of a band operating at the peak of its powers. The short songs on the EP, including early single “Earth To Mike,” are all jittery fire. The longest song, “Small Man Big House,” is practically a cynical comedy riff. The band recorded the song using cartoonish idiot voices, the kind of move that the Dead Milkmen might’ve once done. The whole EP is fun as hell, and you can hear it below.
The Here Comes More Bad News EP is out now on Industry Standards, the label run by guitarist Stewart Kuhlo, and you can get it at Bandcamp.