When Gut Health burst out of the gates into mid 2021, they were quick to grab the attention of the local music community with their mishmash of post-punk dynamics, arty experimentalism and new-wave-esque razzle and dazzle. Without sharing any recorded material, they were quickly sharing stages with some of Melbourne/Naarm’s best, and now one year into their existence, they’ve finally satisfied us with a first taste of the band on wax with Electric Party Chrome Girl.

With four tracks clocking in at bang on ten minutes, Gut Health don’t mess around on their debut EP. Even its title is fairly telling of what to expect, which is a restless, volatile and dangerously fun blitz. ‘Inner Norm’ sets the tone quickly, with its waves of guitar and synth over an unrelenting bass groove, while Athina Uh Oh’s contorting vocals bounce gleefully over the racing instrumentation. The rest of the EP follows suit - ‘Lethargic’ comes loaded with attitude over a propulsive rhythm section, ‘Shut Down’ showcases the band’s hookiest sides with its sugary melodies and elastic guitars, and ‘Barbarella’ captures Gut Health at full force as they charge to the finishing line, wrangling all of the group’s defiant charisma and chemistry into one final blast.

To give us the lowdown on Electric Party Chrome Girl, bassist Adam Markmann has walked us through each track on the EP.

Inner Norm

This was the first track that Dom brought to the group after he obsessed over P-Model one week. The verse developed over a few sessions of us jamming, originally It was just guitar stabs on every beat and Athina singing about a radiator. We changed the verse drastically to be dancier and Athina changed the lyrics to commentary on inner northern culture, but also self reflective criticism, hence us laughing at ourselves with the phrase “hello neighbour”.

Lethargic

‘Lethargic’ originally had the lyrics “I’m lethargic, it’s cathartic” during the chorus. We kept the name ‘Lethargic’ though as the song is super quick and anything but lethargic, seemed funny and ironic at the time. There are a couple of Pylon rip offs if you can hear them!

Shut Down

I wrote the bass riff around the time that Bachelor Records released a reissue of the incredible Milwaukee power-pop band from the early ‘80s, The Shivvers. They had this amazing live track called ‘Rather Be Lonely’ which had this powerful bass line that stuck with me. The song is pretty much smooshing ‘24 Hour Party People’ and ‘Rather be Lonely’ together. ‘Shut Down’ was a contender to be our first single instead of ‘Inner Norm’.

Barbarella

This was one of the first tracks Athina and I ever worked out together. My friend Ferg helped me figure the structure and guitar lines out for an early demo before the band had fully formed, then Eloise and Dom fleshed them out and put their own spin on it. We were trying to channel The Contortions, with their atonal and sharp stabbing guitars. I really liked Athina’s vocals during the chorus so we matched all the instruments to emphasise that vocal line.