The Lash (2025) - The dirty nil - album review
8.6/10
By O. Jacobs
The Lash (2025)
With only 38k followers on instagram, Canadian natives The Dirty Nil [surely unphased by any lack of social media notoriety] perform at a level of cohesiveness and raw aggression that it might as well reduce you to the feeling of listening to music for the first time. At least that’s one of my common segways into touting this band as “The greatest I've discovered in the last decade” when I get a chance to squeeze them into conversation. This band doesn’t get nearly the coverage or exposure they deserve.
Starting from the beginning - their 2016 debut Higher Power is a rock-solid first step for the band, but it’s the three records post “Husker Du” that manifest into near perfect apparitions of easily-consumable modern punk rock - that make you question: “Where the FUCK did this come from?!” In the best way possible.
Master Volume (2018)
Master Volume is an early opus that snatches you by the throat from the opening line, and doesn’t let go until a bookend-whirlwind cover of Metallica’s “Hit The Lights” comes in before the dust settles. Songs like “Smoking is Magic” and “Auf Weidersehen” are like holding smelling salts to the nose of a slumbering listener, jolting them alive to be alerted that rock and roll isn’t dead.
Fuck Art (2020)
In the heat of the Covid-19 Pandemic barely rounding out its first full year of a global takeover, Fuck Art swerves into view burning rubber, and throwing up middle fingers from the tour van blasting blinding-shred from second single “Doom Boy” - showcasing even more of a pop-punk shine from Luke Bentham’s vocal range. I remember hearing this record first [before the rest] and thinking it was one of the best albums I’d ever found, and in hindsight - noticed the band gaining ground on a continued ‘clean but nasty’ overall tone, but not sacrificing the mission: WHATEVER IS DONE, DO IT LOUD.
Free Reign to Passions (2023)
By 2023, a new NIL record wasn’t just welcome, it was necessary. The anticipation was high for Free Reign to Passions, and “Celebration” takes it even higher. Stomping through all in its way like a heavy metal Godzilla, this may be the best track the boys have ever conceived. Huge, Heavy, Colossal - its chorus makes my brain feel like it was nuked by an atom bomb, so maybe that’s why they chose to go with that cover art. “The Light, The Void and Everything” is a shuddering ballad of dread in the thought of not seizing every opportunity you have in this life, reaffirming the continued existential crisis we may all be sharing. In the meantime, we will refuse to stop jamming while we have the time.
After the departure of bassist Sam Tomlinson [who previously replaced Ross Miller] the announcement of a new release in The Lash felt sudden and ominous. I was unsure of what this project might hold - considering Sam’s onstage force, but was unaware of his involvement in the writing room for the new album. I saw the band twice between the Summer of 2024 and the Winter of 2025 and could feel the energy he brought to the three-piece as a performer.
Kyle Fisher (left) - Luke Bentham (right)
In July of 2025, The Lash landed on earth - and upon listening I was surprised, but probably in a way I should have been prepared for. This record didn’t have the polished, tied-tight finish product sound the last three records in their catalog had, and it was jarring, upsetting, underwhelming. Distracting enough to take in its 29min runtime in like a mosquito slamming into a brick wall - virtually impact-less. “Fail in Time” and “Gallop of the Hounds” were hefty album openers, but it all begins to lose its focus as the tracks go back and forth between overtly dreary [“This is Me Warning Ya”], and unserious riffing [“Do You Want Me?”]. By the time I reached the end, “Hero Narrative” and “I Was a Henchman” felt more like an obligation, rather than a desired conclusion.
I had to sit on this one for a couple weeks, months even. I let the pieces stew in their raw form, until the entire picture began to melt together in a big pot of “Ok, I get it.” The Lash isn’t just a reflection of some inner-turmoil most likely placing some battle-wounds on the band’s sound in the departure of yet another bassist, it puts The Dirty Nil a few paces back to a place where they began, in an effort to reset themselves, but done in a way to show they’ve grown - unless you miss it in void of multiple listens.
The tracks are placed perfectly ying-and-yang - heavy & somber - as you take them in, and this accomplishes a sense of bi-polarity in its personality. This is reality for many, it can’t always just be positivity and power-chords, there are valleys in which “Spider Dream” and “That Don’t Mean it Won’t Sting” exist in real life. Does “Rock N’ Roll Band” or “They Won’t Beat Us” really need some deeper sense of meaning or fine tuned production to get the message across? Maybe The Lash can be a record that stretches the bands legs, and prepares for a new era - but doesn’t need to over-exert itself or promise anything more while it does it.
Distorted Sound Magazine
When you shake off the bar set by the band’s previous three outings, you can look at The Lash for what it is. It’s The Dirty Nil retaining their footing, recalibrating, and staying committed to the bit - but not sacrificing their authenticity shown by the state of mind they’re in during any given recording period, and it comes through honestly in the music. Like a dude in a bar wearing a Motorhead vest on his fourth whiskey sour who probably isn’t in a state to play through a bass cover of “Orion”, but could probably have a shit-ton of fun doing a Karaoke rendition of Ace of Spades for about 4mins.
After many listens, the gems start to come out and make themselves clear among the offerings. “I Was a Henchman” might not be identical to the long form final ballads placed at the end of earlier records, but its message of anti-authority and self-reclaiming in a fury of marching spitfire continues the band’s streak of fantastic album closers [and my personal favorite of the lot]. The strings and melancholy in tracks three, five, and seven begin to round out and take mental form showing a better emotional depth than once originally heard - taking a break from the ‘fun’ as first criticised on listen one. “Hero Narrative” harkens back to Fuck Art in bright riffs played to self-depracation as Bentham sings about narcissism and missing someone you once may have despised.
In the end - The Lash is brutally honest, and authentic in their attack of getting back into the studio while they strategize their next steps, simultaneously calling back to ‘80s hardcore punk and visual aesthetics. Risks were taken in expanding their sound during deeper and softer moments, and they made sure to have fun with the contrary - I believe it paid off.
While The Dirty Nil broaden their arsenal of ways to kick our eardrums’ asses, we remain tuned in to what comes next. For now, The Lash paints an accurate picture of the excruciating hallmark of our current state - “We’re having fun, but what the fuck is going on.”
