Should I review Beach Rats on its own merit, or should I pause to describe the concept?
That’s always the question with these, but in this case a little background may go a long way. The band features several older punks, seeking to rekindle the old spark and play fast, loud ‘n’ snotty music like the days of yore. They lived it the first time and youth is a state of mind, as they say. Which brought Ari Katz (Lifetime), Pete (Bouncing Souls), Bryan Keinlen (Bouncing Souls), Brian Baker (Bad Religion, Minor Threat), and Danny Windas together.
Well, sort of. I also turns out they all reside in the beach town of Asbury Park, NJ -- meaning they connected based on simple geography before the concept took shape. Beach Rats released an EP back in 2018 and, with pandemic shutdowns keeping them all at home, it inspired a full record, which was essentially put together over just a couple of days. So what you get is a spur of the moment-type recording, which is also more in tune with how punk records were made in “the old days.”
Rat Beat features 12 songs, none of which run more than a couple of minutes. As described above, it sounds like the early days of US punk with a lot of sass, powerful guitars and high-strung anxiety. The musicians have proved their mettle with this stuff in the past, and it shows as they light the spark with opener “Bikes Out,” which quickly cascades into a raging explosion. It’s tense, fast and it’s just unpredictable enough to keep interesting. “Dress For Sick Sesh” brings another blast of that beach punk theme with a little slower, wave rider jam to start, before intense drumming shifts gears. The song goes up and down in tempo, led by Windas’ ability to switch directions on a dime (with help from some prominent bass lines to segue the way). There are some nice call and response moments in “Rat Beat” and “Saturday” has some nice sea-saw action with an earworm melody that also helps pace things out, placed in the middle of the album. “She Was A Goner” closes on a nice chord progression.
The first two songs are really the highlight of the record, though. Overall it drags in the middle, before picking back up with the ironic “Fuck You Dad,” which I’m not sure if it’s meant to be a winking nod to the adolescent songs of yesterday or maybe it’s about what their own kids (and grandkids) say to them today. The dual guitars and drums make Rat Beach work, but I just can’t vibe with Katz’ vocal style. His drawl sometimes feels monotone to me, and the songs blend together. At its best, the record delivers high energy that changes direction frequently, often building to hyper mode, but it struggles to maintain the intensity even on such a short record. Let’s just say the surfer/slacker vibes of Katz’ vocals fit the beach theme really well, but they also don’t really connect with me. I’ve never been much of a Lifetime fan either.
The waves gain a lot of momentum, but they tend to dissipate rather than making hard contact against the beach.
