







Teenagers understand 'stuff'. They can write nineteen text messages in the time it takes me to find the 'H' for 'hello'. Or, at least they could do, if they still used texts and had not moved onto whatever it is that has replaced that 'what is up' application these days. They also know that 'cloud' has two meanings, with one of them being something to do with technology and have moved onto Instagram because Facebook is so 2015.

However what the teens should not really understand is the experience of what it was like to be around the original British post-punk movement as it is developed into a definitive scene in the 1980's. As such 'us 40 something olds' can revel snugly in the knowledge that post-punk is ours, it defines our youth and no other subsequent generation is really able to understand it, let alone use it as a musical influence.







Unless of course you are a band of four teenage girls fresh out of high school in Los Angeles, who plainly did not get that particular e-mail and obviously did absolutely nothing with their educational years apart from listen to the first three albums by The Cure and a whole host of mid 1980's brooding jangle-pop bands. Armed with such a knowledge, a thirst for all things retro and an obviously vast array of talents, Los Angeles four piece The Pantones, have not only managed to produce the best and most realistic post punk sound of recent times, but have even had the absolute temerity to make enhancements to the genre's wonderfully dense gloom.

Initially the interplay of the two bass guitarists (Angeline Doctor and Madison Alcala) sets them apart from other recent PP bands and in a tracks such as Control (see below) and the absolutely brilliant Self Denial their constant signature sound foundation of The Cure gloom and is added to by an aesthetic provided by vocalist Isabel Salinas who adds an alluring sweetness that adds a startling vibrancy such is the 'sweet antithesis' to the general malaise. It is just an intriguing aesthetic that totally compels.



