Make no mistake, this debut is up there with the finest punk-rock albums released this year.

Maria Iskariot is a Dutch-language punk band from Ghent. Front-woman Helena Cazaerck and guitarist Loeke Vanhoutteghem formed the band in 2022 after meeting at a literary festival, later adding drummer Sybe Versluys and bassist Amanda Barbosa. The band name is a mix of the sacred, Maria, and the damned, Judas Iskariot.

Helena Cazaerck says, “We are four people that have found each other. Being a gang, having fun and creating something meaningful together, is our way of coping with the madness attacking us from inside and out. We try to make something beautiful out of frustration, unwanted complicity, greed, fingerpointing, ugliness. We choose life.“

If your Dutch is as good as mine then you won’t be picking up a lot of the lyrical meaning out of this album. The odd bit requires no translation, the on-point attitude and strong voice carries the rest of it. Musically though, this is really bloody good. The rock is incredibly strong with these ones. They sometimes wear their influences on their sleeves as with the faithful cover of the Pixies ‘Tame’, here called ‘Tijm’

‘WaaromDaarom’ translates as “Why? That’s why!” This track kicks off the album in fierce, ferocious style.

The singles have all been top notch. ‘Leugenaar’ translates as ‘Liar’ and finds the band at their angriest.

The most recent single was ‘Witte Rook’ and ‘Dat Vind IkLekker’ was the earliest release back in 2024.

The rest of the non-single tracks are all interesting, some are very good indeed. This album is well worth forty-eight minutes of your time.