Hi, everyone. 3thony 5tano here, the Internet's busiest music nerd. It's time for a review of this new Melt-Banana album, 3+5.

Yep, new record from Japanese punk veterans, underground legends, Melt-Banana. They have over three decades under their belts as a band. As of this point, this is their ninth full-length album, a record that I'm surprised it took this long for us to get. I actually assumed on some level that Melt-Banana's last album, which came out over 10 years ago at this point, was going to be their last because that would be the longest wrap in time between any two Melt-Banana albums, and that's quite a long time to wait for a new album. There are some bands who break up and reform in that time period.

And yet here is Melt-Banana going strong with a new album, but they still have some big expectations to meet with this one. And that's not just due to the wait, but also because of just how good their last album Fetch was. It was truly their most dense, methodically produced and intense record so far. It was an album that represented everything that made Melt-Banana special in the realms of hardcore punk and noise rock, but fine-tuned like a well-oiled machine.

On this record, you have the band's trademark speed, their bright sporadic guitars, the overwhelming noise, the glitchy electronics, not to mention frontwoman Yasuko Onuki's very high-pitched and shouty lead vocals, which typically slice through all the mayhem happening below.

Fetch, in comparison with previous Melt-Banana records, was not an album whose performances were presented in a very raw or organic way, but that was made up for with just how vibrant and detailed the production was. Plus, going about things in this manner may have just been the best direction given that the group had been whittled down to a duo at this point in their career. You also might assume that streamlining the recording and creative process, as well as breaking down the band's lineup, might lead to possibly more output, maybe a quicker release schedule.

And yet it still took us a decade to get 3+5, which to my ears is a notably weaker record than its predecessor. It's significantly shorter. Musically and aesthetically, it's lacking any real genuine novelty, as many of the riffs and groups and musical ideas held within these tracks feel like lesser versions of stuff we heard on Fetch 10 years ago.

Once again, the production on this thing is reading a very tightly assembled multi-track arrangement, which is totally fine, but it's a disappointment when listening to these tracks; it feels like what we're getting this time around is much more dull with some pretty claustrophobic mixes, too, where the guitars run very thin, the bass has very little presence. The drums – they're there, they're making a lot of noise, but they don't have a lot of impact or punch. The fact that they are sequenced becomes much more apparent this time around, too. The electronics and glitchy bits that we have heard on many a Melt-Banana album in recent years just leave a lot to be desired as well. Then finally, Yasuko's vocals, while the performances are certainly hype and passionate and intense, the way her singing is layered and EQed just makes her voice sound very chirpy be strangely grating too, considering just how much I enjoy the band's back catalog and what she tends to bring to Melt-Banana's sound.

Look, overall, I'll say the sound, the presentation of this album, it's passable for general noise rock, general hardcore punk standards. But given the past successes that Melt-Banana has had over the course of their catalog, it could be better because we're not talking about your average punk rock band here. We're talking about one of the most unique punk bands point-blank period in the past 30 years.

But yeah, there are numerous tracks on this thing that just feel like stripped back, slightly less impressive versions of ideas we've heard on Fetch, be that on the opening track "Code" or on "Puzzle" or on "Hex", which I think is maybe the most shining example of a song doing exactly that. But the riffs and the writing, it's still so good that you can't really deny the stroke of genius there.

But generally speaking, though, in comparison with Melt-Banana's last record and some of their past works, too, the song structures are a bit shorter, less ambitious, and even when it does feel like the band is trying to layer things up, get a bit more experimental and epic, like on the track "Stop Gap" in the second half. The very cluttered mixes just leave things sounding like a clusterfuck. And in the case of "Whisper", which features some very buried vocals, it's almost like demo quality. Even the somewhat grandiose electronics on the closing track "Seeds" come across as flattened – the click track for the song being casually thrown into the mix in a cheeky way is not really all that flattering either.

Look, though, in the record's defense, I will say the basic bare bones elements of what this album would need to bring to the table in order for it to be a Melt-Banana album, those things are here. And there's a handful of highlights, too, like "Case D", for example, which has this very interesting linear song structure that brings a lot of electronics and progressive tension, a really huge explosive climax toward the finish. And there's also "Scar", which is handily the most harmonious and anthemic and hooky song on the entire album. Really one of the band's most melodic cuts in a long time, really since their notably poppier Bambi's Dilemma in 2007.

But that's about it for highlights on this very short, very scant, not so gratifying meager album that, frankly, I think is one of the weakest in the Melt-Banana catalog. The record still does bring a lot of speed and fury to the table, for sure, but they've made much better music in the past. I feel like what they're doing here is on par with bands that have half their talent and a much less definitive sound.

As a result, I feel like what we've got here is just an average record, which is why I'm feeling a light 6 on this one.

Anthony Fantano, Melt-Banana, Forever.