★★★★★
Soft Loud Soft
The template for soft verses and loud choruses is at least as old as the Pixies. At least. Of course, everyone from Nirvana and the thousands of bands that begat them have since used the formula to startling effect, but no one does it quite as unexpectedly as New York's Big Ups...
- www.popmatters.com
2014-01-29
★★★★★
Brooklyn's Big Ups have recently been ripping up most of New York's smaller dive venues. But though the toilet circuit suits their scuzzy, slacker snarl-punk perfectly, this debut album shows they're setting their sights much higher. On '18 Hours Of Static' they manage to capture the frenzied nihilism of their live shows, but also transcend them to become an incisive indictment of modern life...
- www.nme.com
2014-01-21
★★★★★
"I feel like I've led a pretty happy life," Big Ups frontman Joe Galarraga lets slip during a few uncharacteristically chipper seconds of "Goes Black". He's not even through with the sentence before he finds a way to bum himself out: "...how come all I can remember is the strife?" What's bugging Joe Galarraga? Well, whaddya got? Compulsive self medication, Gen Y apathy, the wastefulness of disposable razors: no matter the subject, Galarraga's got a few choice words on the topic...
- pitchfork.com
2014-01-17
★★★★★
This Brooklyn band's debut full-length is a ferocious set of post-hardcore rock reminiscent of Fugazi, The Jesus Lizard and Shellac, featuring dynamic, anxiety-fueled songs with politically charged lyrics that shift back-and-forth from moody spoken-word post-punk to raging hardcore punk. 1/17/2014
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- kexp.org
2014-01-18
★★★★★
Sometimes its about the pure rush of adrenalin, sometimes its about the anger, and sometimes its all how it all fits together. Big Ups' début record fits in that latter category as Eighteen Hours of Static feels more like a concept album and presents with an incredible amount of unity and design for a primal hardcore experience. It's not just about is abusing vocal chords for the pure hell of it...
- www.thelineofbestfit.com
2014-01-15
★★★★★
If ever there was a case for musicians living a life at odds with the music they create, Big Ups is it. These four grads from NYU's Music Technology program got together to make 90s post-hardcore heavily indebted to the Touch and Go and the Dischord Records rosters. Some might call them dilettantes; others will say it's just the band members escaping the dreary life of the tech industry (bassist Carlos Salguero Jr. is reportedly somehow involved with Google Glass)...
- exclaim.ca
2014-01-14
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