Hounds and Harlots' three-song demo of sorts, Are You with Us?, begs a prety basic question through a simple but effective, street punk/Oi!-tinged sound.

It would be easy to draw a sloppier Street Dogs comparison, but these songs don't feel as brute. Maybe there's a poppier Swingin' Utters feel here, with the looseness of "Wasted" acting as a scrappy manifesto. The San Francisco act ramp up the energy for closer "Lot to Learn", and there's some guitar tones in this one a little more reminiscent of their hometown predecessors Jawbreaker, even if the band isn't necessarily in the same subgenre.

I'd like to hear some expansion on the style and overall tightening up in the performance, but overall it's not a bad demo laid to tape.

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Are You with Us? EP