Be Your Own Pet - 'Be Your Own Pet' (XL) Released 27/03/06

Be Your Own Pet are pretty much everything you should want from an American alternative band. Slicing guitars played by brooding young men with extravagantly volumised haircuts, driving machine-gun drumming which makes Keith Moon sound like a bit a wuss, led by a nubile bottle-blonde who sings like a dream-ticket of Debbie Harry and Courtney Love, and already has indie-boys wet-dreaming of being covered in her hot, steaming puke. Their tunes are short-sharp blasts of garage punk more akin to a smash-and-grab raid carried out with such infectious zest you can’t help eagerly handing over the goods with an insane grin on your face.

BYOP leave a trail of scorched ground behind them as they blister through the opening of their eponymous debut, which mercilessly crushes any grumbling resentment that the admittedly well-connected Nashville 18-year-olds have swept up a dust-ball of hype with a dry storm of style. ‘Thresher’s Flail’, ‘Bunk Trunk Skunk’ and stand-out forthcoming single ‘Bicycle, Bicycle, You Are My Bicycle’ form a thunderously, thumping triptych of white-hot noise which kicks in, speeds up, slows down then builds up to a frenzy - slapping the listener round the face throughout a pressure packed five and a half minutes.

Over all this, Jemina Pearl (great name, great voice) seductively whoops and wails away about “never having this much fun”, being “an independent motherfucker!” and “stealing away your virginity”. None of these sentiments broker any kind of argument. We’re finally allowed to snatch a breath five songs in with the (relatively) sedate new single ‘Adventure’. Although the song initially sounds pedestrian after the adrenalin rush of the album’s opening, it demonstrates BYOP are capable of taking things down a notch to offer up a tune reliant on more ‘conventional’ means if they want to.