<< Back To Press Melody Maker: Heartworm, October 1995 Dark and dirt. Twilight skies the colour of bruises. The language of suffering. Faces seen through rain smeared windows, twisted and ugly. Silence, vast and arctic. A bacchanal. Madness and tragedy. Nightmares and obsessions. Old wounds rubbed raw. Dirt and dark, dirt and dark. Its all about passion, the moment when the red fog rises., when the walls come down, when self-control does a runner and all thats left is a naked, primal instinct- as vivid as a punch in the face, the beast inside unbound Passion as Whipping Boy know, cuts both ways. Theres the passion of lovers and the passion of enemies, and sometimes when its late and quiet and all you have got for company is your paranoia- its hard to tell which one is which. The agony is also the ecstasy, like it or not and its this uncertain, disorienting world that Whipping Boy inhabit. Most people that I know who have heard them ally them to Joy Division, Echo and the Bunnymen and My Bloody Valentine. A few of them even mention The Chameleons and Nick Cave, while the smart arse ones throw in Kafka, Blake and Milton, if only to prove that a university education is n't entirely a waste of the tax-payers money.Earnest, sincere, driven by shared desires to explore the deepest recesses of the soul, these are hardly the most fashionable names to drop in our bright n'shiny post-modern world.Still Whipping Boy persevere, and the result is 11 intense vignettes exploring a torrid existence steeped in domestic violence, drunken rucks and peopled by femme fatales, delivered with a wit fury and determination which astounds as much as its subject matter repels. " Twinkle" (about how you can't love a girl who is bad for you) starts with a fiddle striking up a sad lament, full of sadness and wisdom.Drums tight as a cheesewire pick up a slow (dead) beat before guitars go off like Cherry Bombs."When we were Young" is a wr/tender reminiscence of youth-getting drunk/laid/stoned/nicked for the first time- the delusion that you are immortal filling you with a delicious insane sense of purpose to live your life as hard as you can and fuck the consequences."When we were young/we had no fear" sings Fearghal McKee-who has a voice like honey coated cyanide, a sexy deadly expresso-knowing full well there are always consequences. "Tripped" is the Nirvana track you can shag to. "We don't need Nobody Else" starts out as a coruscating gesture of defiance, a snub to the bullshit and hypocrisy in this world ("They built portholes for Bono so he could gaze out across the bay and dream about mountains maybe" -though McKee speaks the lyrics, his disgust is barely concealed). But it goes on to ask questions. Where do you draw the line? When does your grievance mutate into violence? How can you rail against your perceived injustices before you inadvertently hurt someone? Then he murmurs "I hit you for the first time today"-matter of fact,chilling. Elsewhere, "Personality" is flooded with black, irrational terror, and "Users" crawls all over you like a cold sweat. If you want a comparison that does Whipping Boy justice, think of James Joyce and Martin Scorsese-pissed up angry and morose, ready to hit the confessional with all they have got."The Dubliners" via "Mean Streets". Scary. Uncomprimising. Magnificent. Michael Bonner