IRKED confront the system on their debut LP The Grievance

IRKED have been steadily building their reputation in the DIY scene in northern England for some time now. With an EP that sold out two pressings and appearances on BBC 6 Music, expectations were high for the Newcastle band’s debut album. The Grievance undoubtedly exceeds them.

The album opens with ‘I.R.K.E.D.F.U.’, a two-beat instrumental into which Helen Walkinshaw bursts in, pushing the energy even further. It’s a perfect starting point for the fourteen tracks that follow, which portray contemporary life as a system of constant pressure, where work, relationships and politics blur into one. IRKED don’t offer a single, direct critique, but rather a mosaic of situations, from job insecurity to the cultural scene, showing how even spaces that should offer refuge fail to escape the system.

Musically, the album draws from The Saints, Huggy Bear and X-Ray Spex, but these feel like genuinely absorbed influences rather than punk posturing. The guitars carry a rhythmic fuzz that underpins tracks like ‘Repeat Offender’, ‘The Grievance’ and ‘Freak Pub’, in a style rooted in garage punk at its most direct, simple, solid and effective. Tracks like ‘Settle Down’, ‘Death Cult’ and ‘Green Space’ bring to mind Amyl and the Sniffers at their most ferocious, with the same kind of physical urgency that hits before you have time to process it. The latter also features a saxophone that channels the euphoric, dissonant chaos that made X-Ray Spex so distinctive and fits seamlessly into IRKED’s sound. ‘Vomit’ does exactly what it promises, delivering a visceral outburst in under two minutes.

At the heart of it all is Helen Walkinshaw. Her vocal style clearly draws on Poly Styrene, with its mix of urgency, irony and almost physical intensity, but she gives it a contemporary edge through a powerful spoken delivery that feels entirely her own. In ‘Settle Down’, her voice moves between satire and contained frustration, taking aim at the invisibility of women over 33, the logistical nightmare of maintaining friendships in adulthood and the weight of contradictory expectations. The closing track, ‘Irked vs Area Manager’, unfolds almost entirely as a spoken piece before erupting into a finale the album more than earns.