Russia doesn’t seem like the kind of place where punk rock would thrive, or even be allowed, yet Biting Elbows has managed to do pretty well for themselves. They’re most known for the 2013 single Bad Motherfucker, the accompanying music video went viral and got frontman Ilya Naishuller’s film career off to a sputtering start. He went on to direct the indie flop first-person action movie Hardcore Henry, then the 2021 film Nobody staring Bob Odenkirk (which I thought was pretty damn good).
Biting Elbows is the band’s 2011 debut. It’s a house of great music built on a foundation of ska. A bouncy and energetic rhythm section accompanies the lyrics to some dark places. Rhythm and lead guitar work hard and get along nicely- primarily riff oriented but not shying away from senseless blasting of power chords when the time is right. There’s even a smattering of tasteful synth use throughout, including a nice organ section on City of No Palms.
I love music that doesn’t follow a rigid structure. Most of these songs lack the predictability of verse-chorus-verse and the lyrics bounce between topics, giving the album a very stream-of-consciousness feel. Rather than listening to prepared ideas with this music, it’s more like taking a ride on Ilya’s train of thought.
When aliens arrive on the Earth and demand to know the secrets of rock n’ roll, this is one of the albums that we should show them. It’s got sex. It’s got drugs. It’s got emotional range, switching from heavy and goofy with Kill the Cooks to the mellow and thoughtful closer One Night in ‘99. Plus, it would be nice to include Russia in the catalogue because aliens are cold-blooded and would never land there.
Spud media 