Single Review: The Shorts – Bunker Monkey EP

The Shorts are an punk outfit from Ballarat, Australia and they are set to release of their new nine track EP, Bunker Monkey, tomorrow, Thursday August 16th. For their latest release The Shorts are teaming up with the independent Canadian label Thousand Islands Records who will handle the digital release through all platforms. CDs will be available via the band at shows and can also be pre-ordered on Bandcamp, where four tracks from Bunker Monkey can already be streamed ahead of tomorrow’s release.

Gimme Something is a perfect start to Bunker Monkey, frantic guitars and woah choruses set the the mood for this epic nine track EP,  throughout the Bunker Monkey EP The Shorts continues to mine influences from the era when The Offspring, Green Day and Rancid came to prominence and unexpected commercial success. Whilst much of Bunker Monkey is straight up skate punk and punk rock there are moments when they head off on their own tangent, Wall Street offers a ska influence, Lenny The Shark brings reggae into the mix and Your Party Sucks and Here Forever brings a more laid back slacker approach that stops Bunker Monkey being a one dimensional affair.

There’s an obvious comparison in particular to the glory days of The Offspring in both the attitude, vocal delivery  and approach, and it’s fair to say that if you’re a fan of that band you should already be ordering Bunker Monkey, but this is not a predictable EP of two minute punk rock songs, although there are five fine examples of them, as amongst the nine cuts lie four equally short but not as sharp moments. The Shorts have released a fine EP that may wear it’s influences on it’s sleeve but they stamp their own personality onto Bunker Monkey as they blast through it’s nine tracks.

The Bunker Monkey EP can pre-ordered via Bandcamp here

The Shorts Facebook page can be found here