New Musical Express 26th July, 1986

SINGLE OF THE WEEK

THE NEUROTICS: Living With Unemployment (Jungle)

Yowsah! The Members' 'Solitary Confinement' strapped to a slab, jerked vertical and exposed to the slashing Wagnerian lightning of class hatred. Cower, you simpering postmodernist poodles. Quake, ye running dogs of twee. The reworking, recorded live, is the Neurotics at their frenetic, bounding best. They are traditionalists, there is little innovation in their output. It is their misfortune that their forte, reggae-tinged rock, is soooo unfashionable due, one supposes, to the number of cacky exponents of the medium. The Neurotics have a stunning track record - 'When The Oil Runs Out', 'Mindless Violence', 'Kick Out The Tones' - but this, this is their finest hour. Steve Drewitt's voice gets rougher and grubbier--like a rubber glove poked full of fag-burn holes. The band mash and mesh tighter and harder. Articulate/bigoted and snotty. Almost the perfect pop single. "We are your scroungers whoo whoo whoo whoo...'.

REVIEWED BY STEVEN WELLS

SOUNDS

THE NEUROTICS - Kickstarting A Backfiring Nation (Jungle Records FREUD 10) *****

"SATURDAY NIGHT smashed out of my brains, lying on the floor looking really intelligent."

The Neurotics have a smartly savage wit which is honed and directed by their acute political awareness. They have a loosely melodic rough-edged punk beat which generally strikes straight to the heart of the matter.

The Neurotics say that the next socialist government must bring about radical social change and not tinker with the existing political system as one might tinker with the engine of a motorbike, otherwise we'll just end up kickstarting a backfiring nation. They sing about sexual double standards, about manipulation, about despair and about pride. They argue that lip service is not enough and they make their all too valid points with a happy mixture of humour, hatred and basic musical power.

'Kickstarting A Backfiring Nation' is an 'absolutely live' album which should be heard in conjunction with its complementary live 12-inch single, 'Living With Unemployment'. During the course of both records, we are treated almost to a revue in which a number of highly competent latterday ranters get to add their own comments. And, as befits one of your actual five star review albums, 'Kickstarting A Backfiring Nation' raises a number of questions.

Like just why do all ranters sound exactly the same? Do they all hail from Harlow? And why do The Housemartins sell so many records when the far braver, far better Neurotics seem to be banging their fiercely committed heads on a firmly bolted door?

ROGER HOLLAND