Heavy Song of the Week is a feature on Heavy Consequence breaking down the top metal and hard rock tracks you need to hear every Friday. This week, the top spot goes to “U Should Not Be Doing That” by Amyl and the Sniffers.
Aussie punks Amyl and the Sniffers continue to kick ass and take names, and their latest single “U Should Not Be Doing That” is a middle finger to “the bitchy high school way” the haters in the music community sometimes act, in the words of singer Amy Taylor.
The song, released as a stand-alone single with the B-side “Facts,” is “poking fun at the shock that people still feel at a little bit of skimpy clothing,” remarked Taylor, who often performs scantily clad. She then added parenthetically: “Yes, I’m talking to you random 40-year-old metalheads sitting around a table doing lines and bitching about a 28-year-old chick in a band for wearing shorts and ‘selling out.’”
Her attitude is the driving force behind the glammy rocker “U Should Not Be Doing That.” The lyrics are frank and often hilarious — delivered in Taylor’s Aussie snarl — with some juicy guitar lines providing the musical underbelly. It’s an instant anthem and should be on the shortlist for the best punk songs of 2024. Not to mention, the music video with actor Steven Ogg (The Walking Dead, Better Call Saul) is an instant classic.
Honorable Mentions:
BABYMETAL and Electric Callboy – “RATATATA”
BABYMETAL and Electric Callboy are arguably the two biggest names in the burgeoning dance-metal genre, so the fanfare surrounding their collaborative track “RATATATA” is warranted. Tech-metal riffs are infused into a pulsing techno beat, over which BABYMETAL and Electric Callboy trade off on vocals — the former handling the higher melodies and the latter providing the gutturals and metalcore vox. This one-off collab lives up to its billing.
Mr. Big – “Good Luck Trying”
Mr. Big hold a special place in the hard rock/metal canon: a band of shredders (guitarist Paul Gilbert and bassist Billy Sheehan) who are perhaps best known for their power ballads. “Good Luck Trying,” the lead single from the veteran act’s upcoming album Ten, is on the harder side, with a bluesy Jimmy Page-esque riff anchoring the arrangement. Singer Eric Martin’s knack for commercial pop hooks comes through in the slowed-down chorus, where the Zeppelin vibes shift more toward the melodic hard rock of Bad Company.
Redd Kross – “Born Innocent”
Not to be confused with the debut release of the same name by Redd Kross, “Born Innocent” is the second single from the band’s upcoming double album and is a nostalgic homage to the McDonald brothers’ punk-rock origins and 40-plus-year career as the creative force behind Redd Kross. The autobiographical lyrics are reflective and sincere, slotted seamlessly into a power-pop jammer with huge Cheap Trick melodies and layers of vocal harmonies.