"That's The Hook" by Drunk Bat Rescue Team

Hot on the heels of Grail Guard winning the "last ‘Hot Music Live' review of 2025"  race, Drunk Bat Rescue Team have swooped in & seized "first one of 2026". Well done.

Now many of the tracks featured on ‘Hot Music Live Presents' compilations are reasonable bets to be the sort of music on which there could be a broad consensus of not just its quality & honesty but its appeal. Others, which are regularly included not least because more mainstream platforms are less likely to, are more esoteric and it's understandable may connect on a different scale: and download/streaming figures tend to reflect this.

Including the Team's debut "Loaded Weapon 1: Part 2" on ‘Hot Music Live Presents Volume Fifteen' definitely fell into the latter category yet I was delighted on the response & especially the comments: it was in some ways the break out track from that album.

I think the scale of the success rather took the Team members by surprise. Intended as an experimental project alongside the higher profile Stegosaurus Sex Party (although it is worth noting that they are evolving the sound of that band currently), they were essentially happy to have made the track & any outside interest was something of a bonus.

Now Mik Mac and Muzziness (aka Sick Dick Warlock & Clean Cut Butch) have the follow up out & perhaps it won't surprise us that it's not exploiting the success of "Loaded Weapon 1: Part 2": in fact "That's The Hook" is significantly different.

This time out we get much more traditional instrumentation (it opens with an acoustic guitar!) though in fairness it shares its predecessor's insane catchiness, bouncing along on a bassline which picks you up at its entry & carries you along. The clue may well be in the title here.

If last time out they were paying homage to action movies & the memorable lines of two of the stars of the genre, this time the focus has shifted elsewhere. Precisely where is something you probably want to have a stab at identifying yourselves as it remains, even after multiple plays, as elusive & enigmatic as the band. There is a certain amount of urban angst going on (the song itself could be used in a soundtrack to an edgy movie) and there appear to be food references. Many of them not very nice to contemplate. It could be a satire on conventional bourgeois norms and gullibility. Among other things.

It seems to be sample free this time (which I confess is probably a euphemism for me not spotting any) and played, as I said, on identifiable instruments rather than the electro approach of their debut: in fact the quality of the playing and the power of the hook might in different circumstances increase the probability of radio play. The sinister vibe wouldn't necessarily count against this but the lyrics probably mean that we'd be talking about the most open minded of alternative stations. We live in hope.

To sum up, it's precisely the sort of left field release which gets the ‘Hot Music Live' year off to a grand start and one which appeals to me & I think will to those tasteful enough to have switched into their earlier song.