Local Review: Bakal — This is Natural. This is Good.

Bakal
This is Natural. This is Good.
10340471 Records DK
Street: 09.14.2025
Bakal = Chat Pile + The Jesus Lizard + Amyl and The Sniffers

A siren loops. Guitars grind. Someone starts moralizing. Then, from somewhere inside the noise: “BANG BANG.” This is Bakal, and they would like your attention.

On This is Natural. This is Good., the Salt Lake City noise-punk duo throws you into the middle of the action rather than guiding you in. The result is five songs that feel less like recordings than miniature performances — part punk show, part sermon, part intercepted broadcast. Just when you think you have figured out what kind of song you are listening to, Bakal changes the channel.

That willingness to disrupt is both the EP’s greatest strength and, occasionally, its limitation. Bakal clearly understands that punk does not have to be polished, linear or particularly interested in behaving itself. But when every song is ready to pull the rug out from under you, the rug can eventually start to feel like the point.

“Betterman,” the EP’s opener, establishes the rules (or perhaps the lack thereof). A siren-like sound loops beneath aggressive guitar riffs and belligerent drums while guttural vocals push the track forward with the urgency of someone trying to kick down a locked door. The song cuts in and out, changing shape without much warning. By the end, the music gives way to a voice filtered through an alien-sounding synthesizer, delivering something halfway between a poem and a message from somewhere you probably shouldn’t be hearing from.

“Silly Passive Boy” initially gives you a little more structure. Its instrumentation settles into something repetitive and consistent, while the vocals land with the blunt force of someone making sure you got the message. Then, about three-quarters of the way through, the song mutates into what sounds like an old radio broadcast. The voice launches into a satirical bit about “SSA,” or “same-sex attraction,” and how acting on those feelings is a “good and just choice.” The effect is somewhere between an advertisement, a political broadcast and a cassette being changed mid-sentence. It is funny, restless and intentionally strange.

“Gun” might be the clearest example of Bakal’s love of the unexpected. There is no transition into the song — a growling voice simply begins to speak-sing until, a few seconds later, “BANG BANG” brings the music crashing in. The track builds and strips itself back repeatedly, moving between sharp instrumentation, call-and-response vocals and spoken-word passages. Bakal seems to enjoy a crescendo almost as much as they enjoy abruptly taking it away.

Eventually, an audience erupts in distant cheers while a muffled voice, seemingly speaking through an old-fashioned microphone, talks about depression, God and Her tests. It is difficult to tell whether you are listening to a concert recording, a sermon, a piece of performance art or all three. The ambiguity is part of the appeal, even if some of these interruptions occasionally leave you wanting the music to stay in the room a little longer.

“Beggin For It” saunters in on echoing drums and a sustained guitar chord before its vocals begin to feel almost like a rap. The song chugs along with the physicality of something made to bang your head to, but it also resembles a poetry reading or a lecture delivered by someone who has no interest in being polite. The guitar grows increasingly eerie and dissonant as the vocals spread outward, calling out to the listener as if they are sticking their tongue out at you from across the room.

By the time “Pretty Pretty Pretty” arrives, subtlety has mostly been abandoned. The track speeds up into a frantic, taunting back-and-forth. Everything feels intensely wound up, with each escalation seeming to dare the next one to go further. Even when the song seems to calm down, it immediately amps itself back up.

Across This is Natural. This is Good., Bakal makes chaos feel choreographed. These are quick songs with seemingly direct messages, delivered through distortion, satire, abrupt edits, distant voices and sonic whiplash. There are moments when the songs end just as their ideas begin to develop, leaving you wanting Bakal to push them further. Beneath all the noise is a clear instinct for tension, timing and performance. 

In a local scene that can sometimes reward bands for fitting neatly into a genre, Bakal seems more interested in making genre itself misbehave. Their version of punk is irreverent, confrontational and deliberately absurd. This is Natural. This is Good. is not music that sits quietly in the background. It’s too restless, too strange and too eager to interrupt itself. I say, good. Let it. —Ella BakerSmith 

Read more reviews of local music:
Local Review: Lonlark — A Whole House
Local Review: Jesse Lovelock — Jesse Lovelock and The Velvet Voices

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