Originally published by Fortitude Magazine. http://www.fortitudemagazine.co.uk.

Sassy, shade-sporting, wide-stanced gunslingers Dirty Saint relocated from their native Auckland to England because of increasing demand for their product, which is a productive and enviable state of affairs seldom enjoyed by the majority of bands.

Professional Beggar and its accompanying videos show a group whose current wheel is just fine, thank you. Heads down rocking for the most part, with Dave Gale’s vocals depicting the impossible scenario of a manlier Ian Curtis fronting Buckcherry, there’s little to dislike here. Truthfully, there are any number of bands knocking out this sort of material with bigger budgets and more panache, but the workmanlike, relatable beauty of the Saint gives them an essential charm.

Time Of Your Life, Lady J and the almost nursery-level lyricism of Tell Me are pretension-free paeons to the twin arts of drinking and hit-or-miss womanising proffered by the hard-rock pantheon, and offer themselves as arms-up, goodtime hammerblows for dancing to. Free Your Mind‘s samples from the London riots are a little clumsy, their placement in the track coming across as a good idea at the time, rather than life-changing rhetoric.Devil is as straight ahead as it comes, with a sturdy chorus and more dynamics than its siblings-extra points for the burly bass sound.

A good night out, one would surmise, and Dirty Saint are giving it everything they’ve got, which is all one can ever ask of any band.