Burning Love

Black Widow [7-inch] (2012)

Rich Cocksedge

Burning Love is a four-piece (this was an extremely recent reduction in personnel from being a five-piece) hardcore band from Toronto which manages to infuse its music with enough rock 'n' roll to prevent them being anything that just blends in with a plethora of other groups. Although I'd heard the name Burning Love a few times previously this was only my second exposure to the thick, heavy, guitar laden hardcore 'n' roll that the band appears to excel at; the first being the excellent "Mess" which featured on the compilation LP City Limits: Down and Out In Toronto and Montreal last year.

Two tracks feature here, with the lead "Karla" being a song about the Canadian serial killer from the early 1990s, Karla Homolka, and the flipside being a cover of a Laughing Hyenas track "Love's My Only Crime." The lead track is also to be found on Burning Love's album Rotten Things to Say, which is due out soon via Southern Lord Records. It's an interesting subject choice but reading through the lyrics I would not say that it in any way glorifies Holmolka or her actions, as it's more a case of looking at events from that person's perspective, without it being gratuitously gory and/or celebrating the heinous acts committed by her. Saying that, there is still something disconcerting in finding yourself singing along to the line "Three days is a long time / For a Catholic girl to die."

In respect to the second track, having not heard the original I'm not in a position to compare Burning Love's "Love's My Only Crime" to that produced by the Laughing Hyenas, but what I can say is that the song is another wall of an almost sludge-like sound that really opens up at times whilst maintaining a good tempo at its core. The other thing that strikes me is that "Love's My Only Crime" has some exceedingly catchy parts.

Both tracks are built around massive guitar riffs that have a thundering quality to them, creating a thick noise that hurtles along like the bus from the film Speed. However, whereas that bus was careering along with almost no designated route to follow, both songs here do have an A-to-B path and Burning Love travel that course with much aplomb.

To give people some idea of what Burning Love sounds like, try to imagine the Supersuckers crossed with Zeke: although not a spot on similarity, this is the closest I can come to describing what I hear when listening to this single, mixing in additional components that enhance the overall result.

Although neither track has the crushing intensity that "Mess" does, this single serves as a perfect taster for the aforementioned upcoming album release (due mid-June) and one that has whetted my appetite to hear more from this band, making it one album I'm sure to be checking out.