Child Bite "Fantastic Gusts of Blood" (Subterranean Sprawl, 2008)

Oh how pretentious. A record review. What do we think this is, Pitchfork? Oh no, it's a WCBN record review, written for the express purpose of letting DJs know what to expect before they put the disk in the player. Talk about a limited audience.

WCBN finally received a copy of this two-year old Child Bite album. One of my favorite bands on the current SE Michigan scene, Child Bite plays loud, intense shows where band members reel around the stage and things get broken. We just received this 2008 CD, and by now the
lineup of Child Bite has changed somewhat. Although Zach Norton (guitar) and Danny Sperry (drums) have moved on, the main forces behind Child Bite are Sean Clancy's unrestrained bass playing and Shawn Knight's demented vocals (he also plays guitar and keyboards, sometimes at once.) Yes, it's true what people say: he sounds a lot like David Thomas from Pere Ubu. Now that we've got that out of the way, Child Bite is fast, tight rock & roll. You can't really generalize that any one instrument is always in the lead-instead, the keyboard, the guitar, and the bass trade off and complement each other more than supporting or harmonizing. There is a lot going on with not a lot of over-production or added instrumentation.

I can't rave enough about how much I like the bass sound this band has, and how well I think it works on this album, but I don't want to give the impression that the bass overpowers the other instruments. It's just that it's much more than an accompaniment. If you like that sort of thing, you'll love this.

Child Bite is recommended if you like Six Finger Satellite, the Jesus Lizard, or things from the 1980s classified as "post-punk".

See Child Bite Friday, November 26 at the Magic Stick in Detroit when they play Hellmouth's CD release party.