Some time ago (almost a year at this point?) I joined into an online music community. Here I met a lot of great people and friends who I cherish and talk to very frequently. One of those friends is Henry. He goes by Tooth Paint in the artist world.

Digital Sex by Tooth Paint

It's an EP that means a lot to me, and I've had a lot of involvement with it outside of the music. I was one of the biggest fans of it when it came out and due to my extreme fangirl behaviour (I still hold the global crown on last.fm for most scrobbles of his music) I and someone I never talked to before started a project to produce a limited edition vinyl. It was me and a dude named jannik, who in the artist world goes by LEG JIT. We worked on the project and proposed it to Henry, who agreed and it kicked off a 3-4 month project and a bond of friends which became unbreakable. We put the vinyl out for preorder and got it sold out within 24 hours. Jannik describes working with us as

"hahah uhhh chill, one of my favorite parts was handing close to 30 packages to the old DHL store clerk and him sing a jolly tune about working in a factory while scanning them all"

Besides this insanely fun project and something which helped all 3 of us learn about planning, the music industry and getting projects like this going. It was an insane experience.

Besides all this. Let's talk about the EP itself. It is insanely tight and hard as hell at some points. It was recorded over a 4 WEEK period and it feels straight out of a Tony Hawk OST at times. I asked Henry how he would describe making it:

"I think in general it was very instantaneous in terms of how songs were written, recorded and produced with kind of a "the first idea is the best idea" approach, which I had to force myself into since there was an online festival deadline. Also having Thrasher skate videos on my Instagram feed every day somewhat fed into the vibe i was going for with the entire thing, making it rather upbeat and punkish lol"

It starts off with Dumb Enough To Think one of the more calm songs on the EP, but not in any bad way. While still being very upbeat. Having a more relaxed singing style which picks up gradually through the song. Which helps greatly to the theme of the whole song, and is a perfect opener.

Hot Flush Fridays is just fucking amazing. It's my favourite song on the EP. It's great to scream and dance along to and it just gets me moving every fucking time I hear it. The bizarre instrumentalism gets through more on this track, which is one of the things I love most about the whole EP. It has it's very own type of sound and style, while not being inaccessible like some projects which have unique sounds.

Then Boundaries! a song Henry sent me early and he let me use in a school project. I can only describe the feeling of listening to it in one way. It's the song you have in your head when you see the skatepark at Venice Beach. It's one of the tracks that I feel would live in a skating video. The instrumentalism of this track is also just so amazing. The only thing is, this track did reach a point of repetition for me. But I think that is partly because I've heard it SO much.

Next is Post Office which goes is hard, abrasive and a fucking jam. It ups the noisy-ness of everything and is very very very upbeat. It is the shortest song on the EP coming in at 1:38 but that does help the fast intense-ness of it.

It finishes with Digital Sex the self titled song which brings the weird-ness of the sound up to a new height. Bringing the glitchy-ness up and with some amazing synth work. An amazingly stressful song to wrap up the whole release and leave you wanting for more.

Overall this entire EP is fucking solid, nothing I dislike. And as Henry's first EP an amazing way to drop the door in on the indie punk scene. I genuinely think this is some of the best modern punk work I've heard. It's just simply amazing. I highly highly highly recommend you check him out over at <toothpaint.net> he is on Bandcamp , Spotify, Apple Music, soundcloud and YouTube.