Following 2023's critically-acclaimed album "Violence", Pound Land return with "Mugged" which despite being their 7th album release, is the first to have been fully recorded in an actual studio.

Recorded live in one intense day at Tremolo Studios, Stoke-on-Trent (UK), 'Mugged' is a 48-minute whirl of raw frustration, kitchen-sink surrealism and filthy noise-punk sludge, soundtracking vitriolic stream of consciousness societal observations.

It's also the first album to fully feature the Pound Land band that many experienced on last year's live dates. Founding duo Nick Harris and Adam Stone, along with Rich Lamell on bass, Steve Taylor on drums and Jo Stone on sax. Additionally on this album, Jase Kester of Omnibadger/Omnibael joins on electronics.

'The instrumentation sounds beefier but the aesthetics are retained, you get a monotonous, gritty punk backdrop fed through a jazz night terror. As droney as it sounds, Mugged is packed with chaotic depth that hypnotically swirls around the fever dream lyrics. The album certainly sounds great, but still feels as filthy as Violence.

The unapologetically poetic vocal performance is still burning as bright as ever. Avoiding mundane attacks on the government and large corporations that have been done a million times over, Adam Stone says it how he sees it. On paper it could be perceived as inane ramblings of a mad man, but in reality Mugged is more like an observational “day in the life of” providing the bleak tales of the frustrating modern day.

Pound Land have once again made themselves impossible to criticise; producing an album driven out of raw emotion and encapsulating those feelings about the subject perfectly, every word and instrument complements one another, resulting in Mugged being everything it was intended to be; satisfying yet unsettling, and indiscreetly real.'

- Jake Hancke, The Cauteriser

'Pound Land do not release music to drink beer to on a sunny Sunday. They are the real rage against the machine – an uncompromising, uncomfortably harsh grind that speaks hidden and unfortunate truths over a machine-like grinding, a smoke belching, diesel-fuelled mill engine powering a colossal, faceless, brutalist concrete building that crushes dreams and excitement and individuality and the beauty of youth.'

- Dark Juan, Ever Metal

'Taken in one sitting, Mugged is an intense, exhausting and oppressive experience. It’s also one of the most impressively uncompromising punk/ noise-rock records I’ve heard in some time. Every single note on this thing oozes bile and frustration. While other punk bands court the dancefloor, Pound Land have been ramping up the intensity with every release. The album is a dark yet unnervingly accurate reflection of the UK in 2024. As our politicians grin through their lies, Mugged feels like the grotesque painting lurking in the attic.'

- Andy Brown, Louder Than War

Cassettes and downloads also available from: cruelnaturerecordings.bandcamp.com/album/mugged