BE N!CE? Not particularly..!
London four-piece BE N!CE return with ‘It’s Getting Harder’, a six-track, fan-funded and independently released second EP. Following on from 2025’s ‘Where Am I?‘, it pushes their sound to a place somewhere darker, heavier and considerably more personal. The absurdist humour remains, but this time there’s more bite.
BE N!CE are a band who are difficult to file neatly. Punk is the foundation, certainly, but noise rock, hardcore, post-punk, nu-metal and great slabs of distorted guitar and tempo changes are all thrown into the blender. Their own bio describes a band balancing absurd humour with biting social commentary, which pretty much nails it, and none more so than on this latest offering which serves up a collection of fantastic ‘stories’ set to an eclectic Punk rock soundtrack.
With Pol Mills‘ distinctive half-spoken half-sung vocal style providing a compelling focal point up front, livewire Emily Harris on bass, Alex McIntosh on drums and Brett Lee on guitar, BE N!CE are a tight unit, in more ways than one.
Opening track ‘FOR THE ATTENTION OF…’ is perhaps the most magnificently typical BE N!CE idea here. A song constructed from increasingly desperate real-life emails sent to vocalist Pol by a stranger, attempting to ask them out. Romance is not dead. It’s apparently just moved to the band’s professional inbox.
Uncomfortable, funny and becoming increasingly deranged, it takes a true story of unwanted attention and turns it into noise-punk theatre. The fact the bloke apparently resurfaced through PayPal two years later proves that truth can be stranger than fiction. I do wonder what the subject of the song might make of it all though? (Hopefully a warning to be less creepy – Ed.)
‘OOPSIE’ takes a sharp left turn into heavier territory. One of the three tracks released ahead of the EP, it brings a pronounced nu-metal influence into BE N!CE’s already rather elastic definition of punk. There’s more weight to this track; more crunch and a distinctly turn-of-the-century heaviness, but importantly it doesn’t sound like the band have suddenly raided somebody else’s wardrobe. The shift suits them. BE N!CE don’t seem interested in keeping genres in their allocated boxes, and ‘OOPSIE’ feels less like an experiment than another part of the same slightly unruly personality.
Even the title feels typically theirs; something throwaway and almost childish attached to music with considerably more heft behind it. That contrast – silly on the surface, much less so underneath – runs through much of ‘It’s Getting Harder‘.
The fun continues with the deliciously salacious ‘BUDDY’, another track previously released, which again heads off into deceptively daft post-punk territory. ‘BUDDY’ initially sounds like it might be about a dog. It isn’t.
Buddy’s real name is Dave. He works in the city during the week but come the weekend he swaps the office for collars, cages, latex and a very different interpretation of “walkies.” The opening gag lands quickly, then the song keeps pushing it further, turning what could have been a one-line joke into a surprisingly detailed portrait of a bloke with a very specific recreational life.
What makes it work is the straight-faced detail. Dave has a wife, apparently not interested in joining in, who instead gives him the cash to go elsewhere; he arrives eager, bounds upstairs, and settles into the routine with the enthusiasm of a spaniel hearing the biscuit tin open. It’s crude, ridiculous, but oddly affectionate. BE N!CE aren’t really mocking Dave so much as enjoying the sheer specificity of him. By the end, ‘BUDDY’ feels less like a novelty song and more like a character sketch. A very, very particular character sketch.
Then comes the short burst of ‘IKNOWGIRLS’. Under two minutes long, it’s a furious transgender protest song that sets out the struggles of trans community, culminating in a chorus of real trans voices. No grand speech, just an angry, get in, make the point, get out, assault.
And then the joking largely stops altogether.
‘GUESS I’LL DIE’ is described by the band as their most exposed song yet, drawing directly on Mills’ experiences of being failed by the British healthcare system and time spent in teenage mental-health wards. But BE N!CE don’t suddenly put on their serious Punk band trousers to deal with it. The personality remains, but beneath the noise there’s something painfully human here, as Mills wraps and screams through their story. After all the sarcasm and absurdity elsewhere, this directness hits all the harder.
Finally, ‘GREEN BURIAL’, which was the ep’s first single release, brings forward an eco-conscious Punk riot, with alt-rock and nu-metal weight behind it. Its darkly comic premise feels entirely appropriate for a band who seem to have realised that sometimes the only sensible response to modern life is to make the joke louder than the disaster.
Across six tracks, which were produced by Jake Stanton at Big Fig Studio and mastered by Tim Turran, ‘It’s Getting Harder‘ feels like BE N!CE are becoming more confident about what sort of band they are – namely, one that doesn’t particularly want to conform.
After more than 80 shows, including a storming performance on Rebellion’s Introducing Stage under their belt, they have tightened their sound without striping away the feeling that the whole thing could still go gloriously off the rails at any moment.
There are moments when the stylistic gear-changes make the EP less cohesive than it might be, but cohesion doesn’t feel like it’s really the point.
BE N!CE sound like a band finding strength in contradiction: funny and furious, ridiculous and painfully serious, political one minute and deeply personal the next.
Most importantly, there’s no sense of them carefully calculating what contemporary punk is supposed to sound like. They simply tell the stories they want to tell and make the noise they want to make.
And right now, while apparently it’s getting harder, there’s no doubt that BE N!CE are getting better.
‘It’s Getting Harder‘ is released independently on 2 September 2026 – get your copy on CD and digital download from HERE
Catch BE N!CE on their EP release tour later this month:
Main Photo Credit: NICK DAVARIAS
Live Photos: RUTH RAE
- FOR THE ATTENTION OF…
- OOPSIE
- BUDDY
- IKNOWGIRLS
- GUESS I’LL DIE
- GREEN BURIAL
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Writer, lyricist, and guitarist with The Viral Breakdowns, radio presenter and passionate protagonist of Punk! From teenage rocker in the seventies, to playing my own original music in far flung parts of the world, I have a love for fast, loud, short sharp tunes with attitude and edge. Based in Chelmsford, you can find me out and about on the Essex and London music scene or rooting through the racks of record fairs, markets and car boot sales, looking for hidden punk rock treasures.
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