Like their similarly discordant label and city mates Sass (whose debut LP is reviewed here), Partition is another cogent and youthful Minneapolis band, whose own first album – which adds seven songs to the five numbers that were re-recorded and enhanced from their formative 2018 Prodigal Demo EP – mines a different side of the noisy rock coin. Their pummeling, convulsive queercore shuns Sass’s angular rhythms and occasional softer leanings in favor of an unrelenting, amps-on-11 onslaught that fuses Bikini Kill, Flipper, and the early, pre-Cut era Slits, with the instruments of bassist/singer Taylor Nice, guitarist Seth Jaques, and drummer Evan Thomas Blasing always caked in layers of cruddy, squalid distortion. Like a deranged mad scientist, the pig-tailed and motley mascaraed Nice – two years sober after battling mental health and drug abuse issues following the group’s initial formation in Richmond, VA – sporadically punctuates their uninhibited, sneering vocals and blunt, harrowing lyrics with a piercing, Kim Shattuck-like shriek, turning songs like “Prodigal Gun,” “Get Clean,” and “Why Did He Lie?” into impassioned, liberating anthems. (mplsltd.com, partition.bandcamp.com)
