The Winks

Too Hot to be This Cool

Debut full length CD
Released 2005

Imagine Tura Satana from Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! starting a punk band after too many tallboys and you'll understand the eternal bad girl camp at the heart of this local endeavor. The women of the Winks cultivate a saucy, swaggering dynamic that keeps their otherwise straightforward approach to punk rock ticking. There's no wheel reinvention here, just a 20-minute nonstop burst of come-ons and put-downs. Penny Tration's guitar is surly and industrial, while Amanda Hugnkiss' artfully disaffected vox lie somewhere between sneer and pout, lending credence to the Winks' violently lascivious subject matter. You might call it "do me, asshole" feminism. "He's a Gun" kicks off with twin barrels of double-entendre declarations like, "He'll shoot it in my face all of the time," while "Fuck Me Around" celebrates one-night stands by adopting the horndog mentality of humping dumpers just out for a fling. "Never Gonna Die" vividly illustrates how one wrong move might send you from the bedroom to the embalming room before minutelong rock celebrations "Turn It Up" and "Saturday Night" reveal the band's less lurid side. There's even QuickTime footage of a live in-studio show for your viewing pleasure. Russ Meyer would've been proud. -----From the Austin Chronicle

The Winks

Debut self-titled 7"
Released 2003

...All four of these tunes kick serious ass. The “hit” is “You’re Gonna Die”, a snotty, full-throttle scorcher worthy of any Killed By Death comp. These chicks dish out trashy, rockin’, mid-tempo punk with lots of fuck-you attitude. In this day and age when the term “punk rock” too often gets loosely applied to whiny emo dogshit and sanitized teenybopper drivel, it’s nice to hear a band playing REAL punk rock: raw, nasty three-chord tuneage delivered with amateurish, no-bullshit gusto. Penny Tration (of the great Dirty Sweets) is on guitar here, so it should come as no surprise that this band rules. And Amanda Hugnkiss is a BAD-ASS singer!.....Lord Rutledge of Now Wave