Texas Platters

The Open Casket

In these troubled times, any band capable of waxing a cohesive 12-pack of slobber punk broadsides in just six hours warrants further investigation. Enter the Open Casket, a thrift-driven local trio led by onetime Motard Toby Marsh alongside brothers Chris and Mike Dempsey on bass and drums, respectively. Harnessing the hammer-down swagger of the Dead Boys crossed with a goofball sci-fi/horror aesthetic, Worst Case Scenario skips the groundbreaking in favor of unadulterated exploitation. Opener "Bend Over" finds Marsh seizing the spotlight by bellowing the teenage riot act to a laundry list of haters. "Black & White Fuzz" detours into radioactive William Castle territory before ending prematurely on a genre-bucking fade out. Somewhere between the two-part "Cellar Walls" and "Torture Chamber," the Casket even manages a garage-minted nod to domesticity on "Happy Anniversary." When the world is running down, fry up a meatless skillet of Hamburger Helper and crank this until the neighbors blink.