The Scratch - Whatever Happened to Friday Night? [Album]

Amazing review by Stephen Smith of Altsounds!

Pony Land Records
September 6, 2010, 07:34 PM

The Scratch - Whatever Happened to Friday Night? [Album]
The Scratch blew me away. What else is there to say? Yet another band I have never heard of that showed up in my mailbox for review. There is something about The Scratch that I really love and is the best band I have reviewed via a mail CD by far!

The Scratch are from Saint Albans in the UK and Whatever Happened to Friday Night? is their third album. It was hard to find any background information about this band except for their MySpace, the main reason being that The Scratch are still unsigned after three albums. They gave up on waiting for the record industry to acknowledge them and went straight to D.I.Y. And there is a good reason why. The Scratch is pure, unpretentious, no holds barred, retro 1980’s punk and New Wave. They are a complete throwback to the more accessible, yet still dark world of 1980’s punk. This band puts you in a time machine set for the early 1980’s and blasts you off. The catch is, there is no way back. It’s a one way time machine. And once you hear this album, you will never want to go back to measly old 2010. There is no reason to leave.

The Scratch's sound is incredible and draws from the addictive, poppy hooks of The Dickies, the seering pop/punk of The Buzzcocks, and the dark, off kilter bass driven weirdness of Australia’s X. All the songs are incredible and, as I said, this band makes you feel you are trapped in time, reliving your favorite moments from the 1980’s again and again. It rips from beginning to end. Lyrically, you have the usual 1980’s subjects. Going to the club, worrying you hair is not dyed right, lamenting that one lost true love, and innocent starry eyed songs about failed relationships or missed opportunities. There is also a hefty dose of snotty, ugly, punkish reality and rebellion. There is some ugliness form the 1980's from which you cannot esacpe. So be careful about what you dream. This is about the 1980’s that really was, it is not the 1980’s that we tend to sugarcoat in our memories.


For those of you unlucky enough to not have grown up in the 1980’s, there is still plenty of great music for you here. The Scratches’ musical style is viscous and hopelessly catchy and transcends time. At times, some of the songs venture into the malicious sneer and attitude of The Sex Pistols. At other times the harmonies are so lush they head into the world of the 1970’s glam of T-Rex. No matter what, The Scratch manage to make their music modern and fresh sounding, mainly due to the huge sounding production. I challenge you to find a new punk release that sounds as good as this.

I just can’t get enough of The Scratch’s, Whatever Happened to Friday Night? The addictive, ultra catchy hyped-up, hand clapping, head moving choruses do me in every time. I’m so hyped about this album I’m tempted to go off on a lengthy track-by-track synopsis but I must hold myself back. Sadly there is no music available from these guys to post directly on here but luckily enough I have a link to their MySpace which is included below.

Check out the following songs:

* ‘Teen Idol’,
* ‘You Want the World’,
* ‘Destroyed by the Look of Love’,
* ‘Girls World’, and
* ‘Against the Grain’.

Click below, and bon voyage. Hope you come back from the 1980's OK.