Gilla Band’s Pugnello earns five stars for fiercely experimental rock

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Gilla Band’s Pugnello earns five stars for fiercely experimental rock

The Guardian · 2 hours ago

Gilla Band's fourth album, Pugnello, has received a five-star review for its aggressive, experimental approach to rock music. The Dublin quartet has been widely celebrated since the album's announcement, with peers hailing them as "Ireland's most influential band since My Bloody Valentine" and crediting them with reinventing guitar music. The album represents a boldly original work that defies easy categorisation and challenges listeners' expectations of what alternative rock should sound like.

The 42-minute album prioritises texture and dissonance over conventional melody, featuring jagged instrumental shifts, distorted bass lines, and electronically treated vocals. Frontman Dara Kiely delivers spoken-word performances that oscillate between raw, anguished screams and absurdist references to cartoon theme tunes and children's television. The reviewer describes the sound as resolutely contemporary, glitching and juddering like a faulty signal, drawing comparisons to experimental industrial techno rather than traditional alt-rock, with echoes of The Fall in Kiely's vocal delivery and acerbic wit.

  • Gilla Band's fourth album earns five-star review for fearless experimental approach
  • 42 minutes of texture-driven noise prioritising dissonance over melody
  • Compared to My Bloody Valentine; influences range from industrial techno to The Fall

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Originally published by The Guardian as “Gilla Band: Pugnello review – furious originality fuelled by cathartic aggression and absurdist confessions”.