A five-piece from Rome, Giuda have their heads firmly fixed in the mid-70s, combining the driving rock of vintage AC/DC with the hooks of glam and just a touch of punkish attitude. Their debut album, racey roller garnered the band a considerable following (including Def Leppard’s Joe Elliot) and resulted in a number of tours across Europe and the US.
Overdrive is a two-track single released via Rise Above records and it captures the band in full flight. The title track is a cheeky mix of T Rex (get it on), AC/DC (Jailbreak) and Kiss (shock me), all sweeping chords and pelvis-shattering rhythms. Rough enough to capture the grit of old-school rock ‘n’ roll, but with enough depth to suggest that the studio has been put to good use, overdrive is a cheery anachronism, harking back to the days of The Rock Star, all platform heels and vaguely inappropriate leather, and it’s hard not to be caught up in the sheer, wide-eyed naivety of it all. Better still is the darker, feed-back-strewn lunar eye, which suggests a band with ambitions that stretch beyond big choruses and into the realms of the psychedelic. With cinematic undertones, more than anything lunar eye sounds like the sort of gem that Quentin Tarantino would unearth to score a key scene in one of his movies and, with its tough groove and killer riff, you can be sure it would fit perfectly.
Short and to the point, overdrive is a great rock ‘n’ roll single, no more and no less. On the A side you have a cracking track with a killer hook, whilst on the B side you have an instrumental that simply cooks. Available on 7” vinyl, this is pretty awesome (oh and the art work’s great too!) – check it out! 8
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