COFFIN PARTY

 

No fanfare for the last day of 2023, just a ripper from Aesop and Jeff (same dudes who brought us LETHAL LIMITS). Twenty minutes of filth and frustration with hooks that barely feel like they belong on hardcore this disgusting ("Clown" and "Solidarity" are the best examples of this) and Jeff's guitars swarming all in and around the recording. No fanfare for the last day of 2023, but a plea for continued growth and less fucking pain - less pain inflicted and less pain endured. Not ready for the coffin party just yet. 

COFFIN PARTY

KREMLIN

 

I remember when KREMLIN dropped (and I'm pretty sure I muttered about these remembrances the last time I posted a KREMLIN tape), it was the kind of oh fuck - *this* is the punk shit!! feeling that everyone kinda had when København exploded on the scene ten years earlier. This time it settled in a little faster (probably because we remembered how we felt cranking GORILLA ANGREB and AMDI PETERENS ARMÉ), but the impact was severe. In two years, these three mutants cranked out a handful of tapes, one single and one 12" ripper and then poof - like good punk bands are supposed to do, they vanished. Unlawful Assembly reissued everything earlier this year (thanks and praise), but here are the four songs that started the whole fukkn ball rolling. 

 KREMLIN

PUNK SINGLES

Remember a few days ago when I posted that (killer) SOCIAL UNREST demo and talked (for the umpteenth time) about how cool mix tapes are and what an invaluable service the tape makers and traders provided for their contemporaries (and countless punks to come)? Well, allow me to present this unnamed slammer probably created sometime in the early 1990s by persons unknown. DOGS, NUNS, EAT, ANGELIC UPSTARTS, THE FREEZE THE FUCKIN' FLYING A-HEADS, NORMALS, BLEACH BOYS, MOLESTERS, SLEEPERS....all tracks taken from singles that were probably (almost) affordable when this tape was put together. Solid as fuck from start to finish - this is the kind of tape that distracts you when you put in on while you're hanging out or trying to do shit. also the kind of tape that makes you want to just sit and listen and think about all of the records you don't have. 

PUNK SINGLES MIX TAPE

TERENCE HANNUM

 

An early solo work from Baltimore's TERENCE HANNUM (of AXEBREAKER, LOCRIAN, CITY OF LIARS and several others) presented as a soundtrack to La Répétition - haunting accordion and painfully deliberate guitars spread out over thirty minutes. It's winter in the Northern Hemisphere...if it's cold where you are or if it's cold in your heart, then you know what to do with these sounds. 

LA RÉPÉTITION

THE ATTACK

 

The timing of this release is pure perfection - hard to imagine a DIY hardcore release sounding more '2001' than the self titled demo from THE ATTACK. Pure Thrash2K political-posi vibes and a general loose approach that makes me want to pull out the LIFES HALT record and have a living room mosh down memory lane. Readers should recognize that throwing LIFES HALT around as a reference is not something that I do casually....THE ATTACK just hits just fukkn right. 

THE ATTACK

COLLUSION

 

Members from MISLED YOUTH, BRAIN TOURNIQUET, PURE DISGUST, RASHŌMON and a host of other heavyweights combined forces for this demo in 2014 and my friends....if only COLLUSION hadn't been a one off. Maybe they were best known as the band that COKE BUST bassist Jubert sang for - or maybe that's just how this West Coast guy learned about the band (that's how it works when you're old/er and geographically isolated - you've been warned). COLLUSION's pedigree is way too deep for the band to be dismissed as some offshoot side project though, and the five cuts on their only release are a fukkn steamroller of marble mouthed hardcore with crushing breakdowns. "I'm Done" at full volume and then I'm done. 

COLLUSION

SKALV

 

There's no place like California's Central Valley, and it get gets even more interesting as you travel south towards Los Angeles. Bakersfield is the last bastion of sun baked agricultural freakzone - close enough to the "cool" megalopolis and all of its culture and self assigned relevance to feel within reach....but one hundred miles is a motherfucker, and walking those streets feels more like Madera or Stockton than Hollywood (or San Pedro). What does that mean? Fuck, I'm just a middle aged transplant from Oklahoma rambling on the night before god's birthday over here, but it seems to me that the punk from places that are a little *off* often sounds a lot more *on* if you know what I mean. We're talking about the place that brought Munoz Gym to the punk world. Jerry's Pizza was an institution when I got maced there on New Year's Eve 1998 and is still hosting gigs in its shitty ass basement. Bakersfield is just different, and the punk that comes from there sounds a little rougher around the edges. Enter: SKALV. Fidelity be damned, this five song metallic crust attack from 2015 lands just fukkn right - raw, intense, honest...fukkn brutal. SKALV sounds like sun baked punk working class from a place that's just out of reach. 

DEMO 2015

PRODUCT KF

Think about the time you first heard COMPLICATIONS. Think about how familiar it sounded even though it sounded completely new (to you) in that moment. Think about how excited you were to have discovered a new band with a new sound who were actually a new band with a very old sound. That's how I felt when I listened to PRODUCT KF last week....and now I can't stop. 

PRODUCT KF

 

SNÄGGLETOOTH

 

The lazy move is to drop MOTÖRHEAD and DISCHARGE comparisons. The right move is to acknowledge the Singapore's SNÄGGLETOOTH spent the 2010s doing for the Asia what INEPSY had done for North America the decade before. Every time I pop one of these tapes in the deck I am transported...every time I pop in one of these tapes I'm floored...every time I pop in one of these tapes? I rage. 2013's Road To Nothingness on the A Side with the 2012 demo (that I've already posted...twice) on the flip.

ROAD TO NOTHINGNESS 

22 DECEMBER 1984

It's been a while since we've seen one of Pat's tapes shared on these pages, but this broadcast from 39 years ago today is a perfect reintroduction to the wonder that is his seemingly endless archive.  There's some weird X-Mess season bits (not too many) and an absolutely stellar selection of sounds. Some of you are feeling pressure to do things you might not want to do this week/end....I suggest downloading this recording and listening to it while you do what you want to do. Or while doing nothing at all. 

KALX - 22 DECEMBER 1984

ALTARALTA

 

Cold, minimal, raw, howling sounds from Providence. I hear RAGANA clashing with an unknown dark wave power. Brooding, passionate, howling lo-fi bass/drums punk that sounds like nothing else but feels like it belongs.  I hear me, wishing that ALTARALTA had left us with more than these six songs. 

ALTARALTA

SOCIAL UNREST

 All hail tape traders, right? Then, now and always.....the things I (continue to) unearth still make me giddy like a teenager who just realized he could order punk records through the mail and have them delivered to his house in Ponca City, Oklahoma (it was a good feeling). Last week, I stumbled upon this SOCIAL UNREST demo buried in the middle of the second side of a tape that featured two snarky sets from THE ROTTERS, a few tracks from SCREAMERS recorded at The Mab in '78 and a ZEROS demo session....and I like to think that somewhere there was a tape maker and trader thinking "The Wizard gonna be real real psyched when he cranks this shit up in thirty years." That tape trader and maker was absolutely correct - Hayward, California's finest export bashing out five shots of stripped down animated punk, Making Room For Youth era from the sound of it. More punk, please and thank you. More tapes please and thank you. 

SOCIAL UNREST 

LOCAL SHELTER COMMUNICATIONS

 

Absolutely brilliant improvisation captured in a picnic shelter in Washington last summer - if there were justice in the world then the Sun Ra bandwagon jumpers would be talking about the Yard Sale For World Peace (and Hair Clinic) family of artists in 2023 and beyond. These heads are light years ahead/s of the rest of us, and I'm here for all of it. 

FLOWER POWER SOUND SYSTEM COLLABORATIONS

SORE THROAT

 

A master clinic in thunderous noisecore crust from SORE THROAT. A whopping 92 tracks (the tape includes the Death To Capitalist Hardcore EP, because tapes rule of course) ranging from damaged light speed crust to chaotic sub-5 second blasts that challenge the concept of music itself. Sometimes you need a sonic reset, you know....? And still after all these years, I can listen to "War Is Horrendous" and "A Bow To Capital" on repeat - the rest of the tape is just a cherry on top of perfection. 

UNHINDERED BY TALENT

GRAND INVINCIBLE

 

DJ EONS and LUKE SICK combine forces once again, demonstrating how effortless and smooth the West Bay flow is supposed to sound. I remember standing at the top of San Bruno in Vis Valley listening to "West Bay Propane" when this first dropped...watching the sun rise over the Hunter's Point and feeling like I actually belonged there. Belonged here. This tape has been a go-to for a long time, and it's not going anywhere.

THE RESULT

MORE: Megakut & Iron Lung

DA PIGS

 

Vaya Von Puerco was recorded during one of those in-between times. Sounding like '86 in '95 meant that you were outdated....not niche enough to be retro or old school. Yet. But now it's almost thirty years later and oh my does this demo fukkn sting. Hard hitting drunk ass Southern California punk - four dudes from Glendale weaned on a diet of FLAG and FEAR just bashing the shit out of "Rock Star," "Beer & Drugs" and "Butcher's Bitch" before they (possibly) fell into regular ass adult life. Wild and drunk hardcore punk that sounds perfect for any times. 

VAYA CON PUERCO

CANTO DE SIRENA

There used to be compilations every Friday, and while I'm not sorry for shirking my self assigned duties I am definitely chuffed when I remember to drop a killer comp on the last day of the traditional work week.  Canto De Sirena starts like a snapshot of Bay Area DIY goth punk with ÖTZI, ADRENOCHROME and DESEOS PRIMITIVOS in rapid succession...so you'd be forgiven for being a little surprised by the blackened melodic crust assault from TORTURE GARDEN that wraps the first side. The flip is all Texas and is just as varied sonically with lumbering dark freak sounds from TOXIC WATER, fiery punk from MUJERAS PODRIDAS, then SO UNLOVED and HELLFURY close out the tape with manic thrashcore and ripping thrash (respectively). It's almost a regional split (TORTURE GARDEN are from New Orleans) which is going to earn you bonus accolades from the folks (okay...the folk) at TEHQ, but this comp doesn't need any help. So...see you next Friday. 

CANTO DE SIRENA

SCRAPIES

 

Listen to "Don't Care" and try to honestly think that anything matters. At all. Even (especially) you. I don't care...anymore...about our feelings. Oakland's SCRAPIES offer an entirely different take on sound as music - their approach is grating, awful, awkward....honest. Lumbering drums and a ramshackle bass provide a platform for a voice that.....a voice....that....a voice that hurts.  There are blips that sound like a tortured primitive JOY DIVISION ("Nothing Matters," as an example), but really this tape acts a glimpse into a world that you are not at all a part of. You aren't even invited. 

WE ARE THE VOID

INFERNA

 

Fierce doesn't even begin to describe INFERNA. Their raw, bombastic hardcore is the embodiment of sonic desperation and this is how punk is supposed to fukkn feel. I don't feel dirty when I listen to INFERNA - I feel heard. 

FACING A FUTURE OF TERROR

LAURA WYRD & WILLOW KELLY

 

Something about this tape just...centers me. The sounds fade into the background and then creep back into the conscious - two womyn from another time, recording themselves percussing, feeling and capturing a series of moments. Immortalizing them for unknown future listening. Creating soundtracks for bay window breakfasts in times and places unknown to them then....but morning soundtracks absolutely appreciated by us in this indescribable now.  A tape as a conversation piece is still more than worthwhile. A tape as a soundtrack to a perfect morning is something else entirely. 

DRUMMING PRACTICE

TOM & BOOT BOYS

 

YOu get TOM & BOOT BOYS or you simply don't. But to get TOM & BOOT BOYS....is to love TOM & BOOT BOYS. For well over twenty years, these Japanese spiky punk have cranked out noisy adolescent pogo punk of the highest fukkn order - this was the blueprint before anyone else was even building the sound. I snagged the Punks Are Alright on my first trip to Japan and for a song or two I thought the whole band might be a piss-take. But no...TOM & BOOT BOYS are a way of life and they are clearly lifers. This Latest Fuckin' Collection Vol.2015 was given the US cassette treatment by the fine folks at Dark Raids (what happened to Dark Raids...if they're still kicking then I'd love to hang the next time I'm in Fresno) and compiles recordings spanning the second decade of TOM & BOOT BOYS. Older, snottier, spikier, and still as juvenile and irreverent as ever. 

LATEST FUCKIN' COLLECTION VOL.2015

DOG PRISON

 

I have a much harder time describing what I like about this tape and/or why than I have just saying that...I really like this tape. Dark and cavernous, kinda noisy and wholly unpretentious with a steady grunge and/or noise rock with a distant delivery and obvious shades of mid '10s goth punk obsession. DOG PRISON are all of those things...kinda. Which means that they are really none of those things, and a band that lands their sound as their sound? That's a band who should have released more than one fukkn tape. But we take what we can get in life, ya dig?

DOG PRISON

MOXIEBEAT

 

Folks, MOXIEBEAT are no doubt one of the most intense bands I've seen in the last decade. Or ever. These three young lads create an all encompassing wall of sound and energy and then manage to fold that wall around you before you even know you're trapped. Or maybe it's that you're being held. The Pop Sounds LP from 2020 is a thing of pure wonder, and now Stressors (released earlier this year) is just a reminder that....MOXIEBEAT are something truly special. 

STRESSORS

WHOLE WORLD 1

 

A most excellent dose of synth-heavy art/freak punk to carry you through the weekend. Whole World 1 comes from Germany, and features bands who came through Germany and crossed paths with the creators. Featured bands include TOP DOWN, NUNOFYRBEESWAX, THE BUGS, FREAK GENES and THE DO NOTHINGS - and I dare say there's not a single clunker during the whole half hour..though TOP DOWN's "Let's Do It" steals the show.

WHOLE WORLD 1

MONSTER SQUAD

 

Just a band of kids from Vacaville - too far from The Bay to be Bay Area and buried too far in the Sacramento suburbs to be a cohesive part of the scene. So, as you do when you're kids and you don't know the rules, they made their own scene and twenty-five they're still the fukkn kings. I think I first saw them in the mid-'00s in Baltimore when a SUBHUMANS tour crossed paths with MONSTER SQUAD supporting CASUALTIES. I had heard about them from folks back home, these kids who exploded out of nowhere reminding a bunch of old scene 'heads that punk could still be (and look) fukkn punk and they did not disappoint. Attitude right, songs tight...they just clicked, and they haven't stopped clicking even as they've grown into adults.  So how do you celebrate two and a half decades of punk and friendship? You re-record songs from the demo you made when you were kids, and you record it the way you recorded it when you were kids. The result is I Love Punk and....my dudes, I love punk too.

I LOVE PUNK

WORSHIPER

 

Can I tell you the thing that instantly sucked me in? I mean...of course I can. It's my blog thing and I've been telling you things for 5000+ posts now, but I still like to think that you're all eager and willing visitors and consumers. The opening track on WORSHIPER's Pleasure Of The Flesh (titled "Pleasure Of The Flesh" of course) simultaneously reminds me of a song that FUCKFACE would have written at the very end of the run when we were all very very high and a song that a band from Norman, Oklahoma would have written when I lived there in the early 1990s. Something akin to "White Vans In The Mission" by way of FOR LOVE NOT LISA in a time machine but with (very) heavy JESUS LIZARD energy...and that's the shit that's gonna hold my attention securely, you know? So I listened intently, and there's no doubt WORSHIPER are their own animal - while channeling the dark and heavy UNSANE, BLESSING THE HOGS dirges that permeated a segment of the '90s scenes. It's not just good, it's exceptional. And it's not just a rehash, it's a rebirth for a dissonant band who had a short and complicated run in the late 2010s that was cut short by addiction and struggle. Unearthed and remixed a couple of years ago after the passing frontperson Mike Parry, the fine folks at Strange Mono and the band's two surviving members have done the rest of us a service by re-releasing this recording. I was sucked in anyway, the sound/s hold me tight and the ugliness is familiar and strangely comforting, but the context makes this release extra. You can feel the ugliness and the desperation, and you understand WORSHIPER even more in the process.

PLEASURE OF THE FLESH

SICK FATE

 

Even more under the radar mid-decade DIY punk from SICK FATE, a Texas one and done who left us with a vinyl worthy ten song slab before dissolving into the mist. You're going to hear elements of bands-in-common (thinking STORM THE TOWER and ALTARS very specifically) with a fierce vocal snarl at the forefront and a nice touch of boots in the mix. Sometimes...sometimes a solid punk recording lands just fukkn right, and that's what SICK FATE (still) does eight years later. 

MMXV

PRIVATE DETONATION

 

What a great idea - a complete reinterpretation of HIDDEN SPOTS' 2008 Secret Noise EP by the mysterious folks at NecroSignatures Occult Library. Murky, swampy, dark freak punk dirges punctuates by a bizarro psych-punk freak rendition of "Stand Up" before "Unkindness" provides the wildest comedown imaginable. A truly unique listening experience, and the context makes the PRIVATE DETONATION release even more intriguing - Plan-It X sounds completely reimagined for a new era. 

PRIVATE DETONATION

MODERN DELUSION

 

One of the many nuggets from the last decade that I'm still catching up to, this release from Zagrab's MODEN DELUSION is instantly addictive. Hard swinging synth punk with a dark SPITS or MARKED MEN vibe....they absolutely nail the sound and all this tape makes me want is more songs (there was an LP the year after this one, so I've got some searching to do...which I love). We all want more songs, right? Songs like "My Life" and "Wasteland" in particular.

WASTELAND

PUSDRAINER

 

This tape...this tape sounds like slogging through this day. PUSDRAINER in 2013 created the soundtrack for this day in 2023 without even the most casual eye towards the future. Because in 2013, PUSDRAINER were clearly focused on trying to get through their day, and it doesn't sound like it was easy. Today isn't either, and tomorrow will likely be a motherfucker, but take comfort knowing that someone has been there before. And they got through it. "Only Stopping To Fall (No Faith Mix)" is the track that will remind you that you can walk even after you stop. To fall. 

ONLY STOPPING TO FALL

LORO DECIDONO...TU PAGH!

Impossible to understate the impact BCT releases had on spreading international underground hardcore punk around the international hardcore punk underground. I shared this tape thirteen years ago, but I was cranking it the other day and was struck for the umpteenth time how absolutely screaming this fukkr is from start to finish. Perhaps there are other BCT tapes with more 'notable' bands, but the CANI tracks here are relentless and bands like LONDON 77, P.S.A., and SAVAGE CIRCLE should not be overlooked. Of course, stalwarts I REFUSE IT!, C.C.M. and KINA make appearances (it is an Italian hardcore compilation form 1984 after all), alongside more ramshackle earnest efforts from NOISENOISENOISE P.N. and VIVISEXIONE who round out the roster. When something's this good, I feel like I should repost it annually instead of waiting another thirteen years....which makes me wonder if I'll still be doing this when I'm sixty four years old. Will you?

THEY DECIDE...YOU PAY!