St. Augustine Aggro-Rockers Terror Management Band Deliver a Fearless and Furious Debut

Formed in 2018, Terror Management Band are arguably a supergroup of sorts from St. Augustine. Consisting of guitarist-vocalist Mike Taylor (Palatka, Halo Perfecto, Flaws), guitarist Alan Mills (Burl, Greenness) bassist-vocalist Jeremy Rogers (Minimum Rage, Dredger, Telepathic Lines) and drummer-vocalist Kevin Kelly (Liquid Limbs), TMB are the latest roster child of Bakery Outlet Records, a label based in the Oldest City that is now hitting 20 years of releasing savvy documents of the local underground.

Taken from Big Box Apocalypsis, the band’s debut, “The Red and The Blue” lurches forward with some tasty early Tad-style bass-and-drum juggernaut stomp, as guitar squeals from Taylor and Mills point the way to the ensuing slaughter. In delivering an anti-anthem ladled out in a syrupy, angular odd-time signature, Terror Management Band are worthy heirs to late-era Flipper and are adept in corralling the near-collapse of those 1980s SF overlords, as well as guitar moves that fill the cracks between transitional-era Sonic Youth and the vaguest bluesy bends. “The Red and The Blue” also features hoarse, interrogative vocals (“Do you want…” is the lyrical refrain) and a bridge that finds the band hammering the tune into atonal submission. The group acknowledges that Big Box Apocalypsis is a “document of America losing its goddamned mind.”

The resulting album and “The Red and The Blue” are impressive stuff. And Terror Management Band is a loud and notable arrival on the Northeast Florida underground music scene.