BILA – Beżżalart
Release Date: 5th December 2025
Label: Go Down Records/Kewn Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Punk, Hardcore, Noise Punk.
FFO: IDLES, Fugazi, Kvelertak, Melvins.
Review By: John Newlands
Ok, so we are winding down towards the end of the year, and it’s nice to blow out some frustrations, clear the cobwebs and headbang away those naughty thoughts mince pies and Mariah Carey in a tight Santa outfit to some high octane, riff-tastic noisy punk.
Debut album Beżżalart from the Maltese trio known as Bila completely fits the bill. Formed somewhere around the end of 2014, the trio have been plugging away, gigging over the UK, Italy and even the US while releasing EPs and 7 inch in-between tours.
The press for the release quite accurately describes Beżżalart as containing the bands “signature socially and humor-charged bursts of rage-fueled, bilingual energy, angular grooves, hooky shout-out-loud choruses, and weapons-grade angry riffage” and here I’d have to 100% agree.
There are hooks-a-plenty throughout the album. Track 1, A Thousand Wolves, sets the pace with its short runtime and staccato main riff that makes way for Drowner, which has a wonderful vocal delivery that makes me think of someone licking a 9-volt battery and being fucking pissed that it zapped their trusty mouth snake!
At the midpoint of the album Bila cleverly mix in Tlebiba, which for this listener brought to mind Bristol post-punk beauties IDLES, but perhaps a little heavier and chaotic and with a wee splash of Daughters for good measure. It’s a welcome change in pace from the front half of the release, being more mid-tempo and long form, while also providing the listener with some different textures to keep up interest.
Moving into the back half of the album, we go straight into Brain Cake, which is a stark contrast to the preceding track. It’s short, fast, heavy and chaotic. Like the musical equivalent of taking a deep breath and ripping a Band-Aid off an open wound.
From there we go back into familiar territory with solid high paced and up-tempo tracks Boltera and Beżżalart, before again slowing the pace for Everything + Nothing, which has some Slint / Fugazi influence which I very much appreciated, before closing out with the 1-2 punch of Bla Buzz and Sin Eaters.
All in all, this isn’t reinventing the wheel, and I don’t think it’s supposed to, it stays in its lane and is damn good at what it does. At the end of the day, this is fun, energetic and hard hitting noisy hardcore infused punk that is perfectly delivered over its 11 songs and 28 min runtime.
I’ll likely spin this again over the upcoming month when in need of a quick Christmas enema after being bent over and stuffed full of Cliff Richard and in need of pulling Santa Claus out of my chimney.
Now I’m left with one burning question…… what the heck do they eat for Christmas in Malta??
(4 / 5)
