Imagine a biopic of The American Story of Punk Rock, produced by Dave Grohl and directed by Steve Albini. In it, Mission Of Burma appear in a cameo - just after Pere Ubu complete The Modern Dance - hide when scary Bad Brains and Black Flag appear on the scene, only to walk off into the sunset with Michael Stipe. Albini resigns his directorship in disgust, and David Geffen takes over the chair and re-casts James Taylor as Kurt Cobain. Thankfully, that film may never see the light of day, but have no fear, punk rock survivors Mission Of Burma are back. And a resounding chorus of approval has greeted them, both in their own back yard, and over here in Blighty.
This three-handed Four Hands EP yields a vintage noise that would have sounded comfortably resentful and dissident all those years ago, but now sounds just a tad short of breath and slightly flabby around the middle. It may be that Class War is meant to be ironic. If not, then there's no forgiving this exercise in shouty, sixth-form polemics. Dirt talks of a mysterious "they" that can only be of course, the dread flunkies of The Man, and exclaims, routinely, that "It's not fair". Stop smirking at the back there, we've all felt like that on occasion.
Still, the Wounded World Dub Mix has some wonderfully Mark E-Smith-ish yelps served up in a Fall-esq grumbly rumble. The whole exercise is fortified by the appropriately titled Wounded World Choir, a kind of Addams Family version of the St Winifred's School Choir. Can't be bad,eh?
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