MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL

 

Honestly, when we were doing key bumps in the Chameleon bathroom in 1996 and talking shit about the MRR elites, this is why. I'm not saying we were right, and there are some straight killers on here....but we simply didn't want catchy punk that felt safe. We didn't need ZEKE and BLINK 182 and even though ELECTRIC FRANKENSTEIN was good - who the fuck cared when you could get high as shit and see RUDIMENTS in a basement on Alabama Street? SMUGGLERS sounded like some Purple Onion shit and that was for the retired set (who were, in retrospect, probably in their 30s). The best thing about SCARED OF CHAKA was that they were on a record with WORD SALAD. Look, in retrospect a lot of this shit is fukkn great - hearing KITTY BAD ASS and DISCOUNT played on the same show makes sense, the SODS track is still a complete annihilator and LUNCHBOX hits the damn spot right now. There are couple of Italian killers (GUASTAFESTE, FUORI CONTROLLO).....but still, we weren't wrong. We wanted danger. Two years later I was a shitworker, of course. 

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL #724

THE WALLFOWERS

 

Damn near impossible to do any real detective work here since the other band called THE WALLFLOWERS were also the Southland and also started in the late '80s - it's just that the other band called THE WALLFOWERS had Bob Dylan's kid in the band and got kinda famous and shit. This band isn't that band. This band coulda shoulda been 1988 college alt famous but I guess they weren't. It was before grunge, and there are serious DRAMARAMA meets Homestead Records energies with a touch of the parts of Soulforce Revolution that you don't like. Could have shared the stage with THE NIXONS (but if you aren't from Oklahoma then you have no idea what I'm talking about). I listened to bands like this while I was listening to ERASURE and BGK and DEAD MILKMEN. I just knew it wasn't Taylor Dayne, you know? I'll never cast a shadow on letting me hear you body rock (if you know, you know), but I was fiending for anything that wasn't that. "Blue Sky's" should have been a hit....it perfectly captures a time that's tough to describe but easy to identify and I would have gobbled this shit up if I had heard in in real time. Forty years later? It still makes me smile - no mean feat in 2026.

THE WALLFLOWERS ©1987

SCRAPYARD

 

No bullshit, just hardcore street punk from the North American continent. 
This tape is from 2024, and there's a full length that came out like two weeks ago that is even better even though and/or because there are some butt-rock leads. Shit is like NYHC and THIN LIZZY. They released it on CD, which is pretty retro.

SCRAPYARD

JOHNNY BE GOOD

 

You're encouraged to ask all the questions you like....I will have no answers. Questions like....."why?!" will be met with an absent shrug, because I don't know why you're listening to this today, I just know that you are. This is like Harajuku Strangers plus SEX PISTOLS with some '90s USDIY energy that makes no sense at all until....it does. A track called "Anarchy" from an Indonesian band named after a Chuck Berry tune?  Yeah...strap in. 

PANDAAN CITY PUNK ROCKERS

CULVERT CORPSE

 

CULVERT CORPSE is everything that I want. Raw, yearning, chaotic, oppressive skate punk masquerading as primitive black metal and/or vice versa, recorded to present like a forced march to hell by way of a tornado. The recording takes the Everything Louder Than Everything Else ethos to dizzying heights (or depths) and drenches everything in a tsunami of vocal distortion, making this the six most exhausting minutes of your day...time to throw in the towel, kids. Life is over.

DEMO 3

JAN GARBAREK GROUP

 

You aren't going to get me to attempt to speak with any intelligence on Jan Garbarek or his grouo....because I have none. Intelligence, that is. Apparently he's Norwegian and is famous for playing the saxophone. I shelled out a few bucks for this tape because it was on ECM and late '70s ECM had some weird shit - I like to gamble. This isn't that weird though, just some smooth and mellow proggish jazz that sounds like a record that was named after the description of a photograph. I found it to be a pleasant listen. 

PHOTO WITH BLUE SKY, WHITE CLOUD, WINDOWS AND A RED ROOF  

ED HALL

 

ED HALL's 1988 debut defies any real descriptors, because nothing sounded like them then and nothing has sounded like them since. They played Norman with some frequency when I lived there, and the live shows were a spectacle that incorporated film and light in a way that most of us had never experienced. They seemed like the third point on a triangle anchored by LIPS and SURFERS but even that assessment may have been based more on geography than any kind of sonic reality. fIREHOSE meets Frizzle Fry at a SCRATCH ACID show and they all roll up on an after party at a fraternity's haunted house - that's what this shit sounds like. But man, watching their drunk ass film guy loop tape into three projectors so each member's head looked like it was on fire? It's the little things that stick with you. 

ALBERT