by Richard Archer
The Eggs have always backed up their ‘do what we want’ mandate  with the necessary skills – abrasive noise, untypical melody and acerbic lyricism – which seem to sharpen with each record. They’ve really nailed a big production here – it’s immersive and augments their usual high quality performance without compromising the immediacy of their set-up.

This of course means that it’s a headphones treat – fuzz-thick guitar and dino-thud drums accompany a tale of mindless excess sung through a nastier version of that effect that BlackSabbath used on ‘Planet Caravan’, plus other studio tricks and trinkets that only enhance the song’s focus.

Clocking in at nearly 4 minutes, it sustains itself with it’s catchy melody that varies only slightly between the verse and chorus sections, hammered into the ears until just the right point for a soaring third section to break the pattern and pierce the brain. The lyrics have a simple and repetitive quality which work perfectly in the psychedelic mix (“I’ll take what you’ve taken/whatever you’ve taken I’ll bite it in two”) and make it very easy to sing along to.

Stylistically speaking, ‘Drug Braggin’ ticks a load of boxes – ‘stoner rock’, punk and of course pop are all conjured up. Weirdly it reminds me of Donovan but I don’t know why, perhaps there’s a folky element in there too. Regardless, this is my favourite thing they’ve done thus far and I haven’t even heard the flipside yet.

eggs