TV DRUGS

 

I really like listening to punk. Sometimes I go far too long without having my ears shredded live, and sometimes I go days without sitting down (in my case: pacing back and forth) and really listening to records at volume. But I blast these tapes...I rip and/or edit something damn near every night that I'm home, and these built in iMac speakers have pump countless low fidelity hours of DIY punk and noice into my earholes. Sometimes I'm distracted while I'm ripping - work, Murder The Cat, dishes - and the sounds are just kinda 'there' until I edit. But if I'm editing in a hurry I might not spend real time with these little plastic cases until it's their turn to share them here. I'm not proud of the attention that I'm (sometimes) not able to give but.....life gets in the way of living sometimes. Sometimes. Not today, but sometimes. Today? Today I'm listening to TV DRUGS on repeat. I sat down with TV DRUGS whle it was ripping and I got lost while I was editing, wondering how I could describe the magic I was experiencing....apparently I came up with nothing because here I am talking to you about shit that has nothing to do with TV DRUGS, you know? This shit fucking demands attention. This is a 'stop what you're doing and recognize" kind of tape. I hear '80s California beach hardcore, I keep hearing rockabilly in the double snare hits on "Medicated" and speaking of "Medicated" there's a desperate MEDICATION TIME energy in the vocals that I am way the fuck into. Urgent '10s North 'Merican DIY stomp vibes creep in with some frequency, but it's tracks like "Consume" and "How Far?' that push envelopes and challenge descriptors. Look, TY DRUGS released a ripping hardcore punk tape back in 2021, pure and simple. Listen properly and you'll get way more than 'just' a ripping hardcore punk tape. I've learned my lesson. 

FFO: EVERYTHING TERRIBLE

HEAVY STENCH

 

For starters: "Trash Can" is among the fiercest hardcore bulldozers you will experience today. This week. This month. It's fukkn intense, and the rest of the Death Or Danger demo is on the same level - beautiful, pure and fierce. The replication is a little muddy but that shit settles in real quick because it's punk and that's what we're used to (we're used to getting what we get, you know?) and I swear it adds extra tension to moments like the rumbling drums on the start of "Full Cycle." If you like your shit anxious and on the edge of collapse, then this HEAVY STENCH joint is going to tickle you like it tickled me. 

DEATH OR DANGER

DISKÖURSE

 

Another book that you are encouraged to judge by its cover. If you're thinking booze-fueled bombastic DBeat dis-tortion then your thoughts are on the correct path. And this path will lead you to 2017's Love Noise, Equal And Peace! from DISKÖURSE. The piercing white wash of the crash cymbals are a bizarre highlight - a noisy recording glitch instead of manufactured distortion perhaps, and it adds an element of tension that falls right in line with tracks like "N.Q.N." and "Alcohol Attack" that sound just barely out of tune enough to make you grit your teeth and regret that last beer you had before bed. Pure and beautiful kång as interpreted by some '10s crushers from Indonesia....I was into this tape when I listened for the first time and ripped it last week, but I'm fucking with it hard this morning. And if you're wondering whether or not there's a cover of "Warmachine" on this tape? Of course there is. 

LOVE NOISE, EQUAL AND PEACE!

WARCYCLE // ZUDAS KRUST

 

Total fucking bulldozer annihilation in the form of nine relentless bursts of chaos from Indonesia and Australia. Perth's WARCYCLE start with an intro that harkens AXEWIELD and then unleash crasher crust hell on alls mortals foolish enough to stand in their way. For their part, Jakarta's ZUDAS KRUST offer four sinister grinders captured on a recording that demands repeat listens. The bass tone is formidable and damaged and the guitars are either *just* out of tune or these punks are avant-crust geniuses...I'm comfortable assuming they are both, of course. "Ini Hidup Apa" is a one riff exercise in patience and makes me want to re-listen to the rest of the recording with more focus (and volume). So that's what I'm going to do now...

WARCYCLE // ZUDAS KRUST

G*U*N*N*

 

I think I maight have shared a G*U*N*N* tape before but I don't feel like clicking through the archives to check because I'm listening to "Can't Stop" on repeat at maximum volume and pretending I'm a teenager wrecking shit in my bedroom while my parents pound on the door. And still, "Thin Blue Line" is the real banger - the one song that highlights how slightly out of tune the guitar is (the guitar that also sits bizarrely outside of the overall mix in the most interesting way). This punk is furious and this punk feels honest...and as the outro attests: "You wanna hear the truth, hit up the G*U*N*N* from OC." 

DEATH OR DANGER

SIEMPRE EN NUESTRO CORAZON

 

You have to understand....DIY punk in Indonesia didn't really start to take hold until years after several generations and movements had evolved and mutated in the so-called First World. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? had a plan to go in 1999 that never materialized, but when CFD was there in 1997 I was on the back of Aca's scooter cruising to the US consulate for some bureaucracy and he casually pointed to a government building and told me about the students who were barricaded there in '97 fighting military cops for days and days. Punk kids.....fighting the fucking army. It was presented so casually and it really put the whole "fighting the system" thing into perspective, you know? Then we had to escape some bandits attacking motorists from an overpass, fixed a flat tire and I forged signatures on a bunch of passports....it was a fucking day. Anyway, this comp dropped in 1997 and that context is pretty important as you listen - you're talking about baby punks who had access to the traditional started bands and the first few waves of US, European and Australasian DIY all at once and I can't even imagine what that information overload must have felt like. Limited access and unlimited date and...well, what if GORILLA BISCUITS and and GISM and CROSSED OUT were on the same plane? Siempre En Nuestro Corazon is what you get. STRAIGHT ANSWER, GENOCIDE, ANTISEPTIC, DIRTY EDGE, CRYPTICAL DEATH - there are more, and every single track is a slammer. Fidelity optional, passion and intensity mandatory...this is the realest compilation I have listened to in a long long time.

WALK TOGETHER ROCK TOGETHER

U.N.I.T.

 

Screaming, squirming, stomping hardcore from the mean streets of San Antonio, Texas. A quick peek at the song titles offers a clue: Violence. Control. Nothing. Fear. And to simply state that U.N.I.T. deliver on the promise those four words bring would be a criminal understatement. Woke up today to a (new) world of shit around me (if you're paying attention then you'll see that it's the same world that surrounds you) so I blasted these S.H.I.T. vibes and looked behind while looking inside. Even when you can't control the violence, it's nice to think that (even for a moment) you have nothing to fear. You do, of course. Shit is terrifying. But the next seven minutes are going to be glorious. 

THERE IS NOWHERE TO GO & THERE IS NOTHING TO DO

FISSURE

 

Quite literally every time I listen to FISSURE I get floored all over again. This was the tape that started the train, a self titled juggernaut released in 2013 that features nine mines of bulldozer PV-tinged '90s hardcore tonnage. Even on a poorly duplicated DIY cassette the weight is unavoidable and the impact is instant - tracks like "Gary Busey For President Of The Moon" and "I Used To Cut Myself To Dashboard Confessional" will stop you dead in your tracks. So indescribably heavy, sarcasm and irreverence pegged in the red....and so fukkn brutal

FISSURE

THE BABIES

 

As the cover might suggest, the SEX PISTOLS energy is blatant on THE BABIES' 1999 release. These Malang City Punk Rockers are so much more than that, but even if you reduce them to a '77 punk rehash they are still brilliant. Eight studio cuts including "Street Punkers," "State Of Mind" and "Malang City Punk Rockers" and then you get a dose of what it must have been like for those lucky enough to experience THE BABIES in the flesh in real time. It's brilliant punk lowest common denominator punk and I can't get enough. 

MALANG CITY PUNK ROCKERS

FIRSTBLÖÖD

 

Look at the cover.......look closely. You know exactly what you're getting here, and you're getting exactly what you want. FIRSTBLÖÖD are a precise brand of ScanDiBeat with howling Japanese HC undertones plus the obligatory SHITLICKERS cover. Like I said, you're getting exactly what you want. 

2009-2011
PUNKS NOT DEAD

INTERNAL AUTONOMY

Hard to understand why this band continues to fly under the radar, but here I am with their fifth demo from 1991 and I'm still pinching myself hearing these sounds for (not the) first time. Authentic dark wave steeped in UK anarcho with BLACK SOLSTICE connections, INTERNAL AUTONOMY are a truly unique (sounding) collection of souls - and to go from the chaotic CONFLICT-esque bombast of "The Time Has Come" and the mania of "Doesn't Anyone Believe Me?" to the PINK DOTS vibes in "An Anthem For Humanity" and the pure proto-goth of "Just Another Day" and "Foresight + Hindthought" is a magnificent feat. Every IA release hits different, and the experimental phase/s at the end of their run are often the most compelling for me - I hear new sounds literally every time I listen. My copy is a dub labeled '5th DEMO - MASTER TAPE' so any souls holding a copy with the artwork....? You know how to find me.  

PURPLE AVANT GARDE NOIZE EXPERIMENT

HISSY FIT

 

The '00s were a wild sonic decade. You might have seen HISSY FIT on a bill in a lethargic Pennsylvania basement with DISFEAR a few days after Hot August Nights wrapped up and the Eastern Seaboard was recovering from a four day cocaine bender. I say that now and it simply makes no sense, but then....? Well, it was just DIY punk, my friends. It was depressed and frustrated and hopeful - and   twenty years later we're struggling to determine which of those emotions have faded away and which ones we're stuck with. 

HISSY FIT

•••••

There are two bizarro electro punk numbers on this tape that may be leftovers from repurposed source/s, but they might also be re/imagination/s of HISSY FIT's Region Rock adjacent approach to addictive anthemic punk. I'm down either way, but detectives are welcome to contribute thoughts. 

SENANDUNG CANDALA

 

Hard skinhead stomps with blatant UK77 influences on this 2014 Indonesian comp. D'ORMAS, PRAHARA, MURDERAT, BRETEL, THE GANGS were all new to me, as was AGGROTHREAT who ironically offer the two softest cuts on the tape. Bonus instrumental ska number from THE BOSSES to close the second side and...well, what's not to like? Exactly. And when there are new sounds to discover and a lot to like, that's when we keep listening.

KOMPILASI SENANDING CANDALA

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL

 

A hopeless number of Maximum Rocknroll radio shows are available to stream on their website, going back almost fifteen years. Yeah the shows still drop weekly, and yeah they are still awesome snapshots of what some punk you may or may not know is digging at the moment. But if you're wondering what a pre-Prank Ken was digging on this date thirty one years ago, then I suggest you blast Maximum Rocknroll Radio #603. You have to remember that this is the dude responsible for bringing ASSFOT, GAIA and GAUZE to the West Coast in the 90s....the dude who gave HHIG the platform to turn USDIY hardcore on it's collective ear. So it should come as no surprise that this 1991 broadcast is an absolute motherfucker; DEFORMED CONSCIENCE, SLAVE STATE, INSANE YOUTH, UOA, IDORA, RIP OFFS, DISCLOSE, BANANAS (yeah, that BANANAS), CITIZEN FISH, CHOKEHOLD and...well, there's more. I can't really image how much these radio shows changed people's lives - I remember looking at the list of stations where the shows were broadcast and thinking "Louisiana? Fukk dude....I was so close" but I was actually a world away. Also, COP OUT's "Over There" is such a beast. 

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL #603

WORLD NASTY ANARCHY

 

Enough nonsense, how about a headfirst dive into late '90s raw hardcore from East Java's WORLD NASTY ANARCHY?  "Hate," "Proud To Be A Punk," "Fuck The State" and "Kill" are a few of the morsels waiting for you when you blast this 1999 cassette...what is waiting for you after that is entirely in your hands.

TRIBAL WAR

LAMAR // RON GRIFFIN

 

I've taken a pre-internet relic and popped it onto cassette (where it belongs) and now I'm putting it back on the internet (where, if I'm being honest, it truly belongs). RON GRIFFIN popped up sometime in the 1990s, John had it on a cassette of oddities that he got from (somewhere) and it just....well, it stuck. It's an incredibly catchy hook, and I still get the opening bars stuck in my hand with shocking frequency - should have come as no surprise to discover as I was doing research for this important project that someone else has already immortalized the track but I was surprised nonetheless. The flip side came into our field of (sonic) vision in 2006 when HIGH ON CRIME was recording in Nashville. Our engineer's main source of income was recording sessions for local rappers and this piece of genius struck him so much that he kept a copy for himself....I thank him today (and every day) for making that decision, and you will thank him soon. The artist may or not be named LAMAR, but I've been saying it was LAMAR for fifteen plus years now so....LAMAR it is. The weird thing is that this tape exists in physical form. I made thirty of them, just like I made thirty copies of the ANCIENT CHINESE PENIS Live On KATT session from 1993 that I expected exactly zero people to be interested in.....but people are buying that one too. Y'all are weird, and I'm grateful for that. 

I'M GONNA GET MY DICK SUCKED // YOUR LOVE IS REAL

DOMESTIC PRISON

 

I keep getting my ass handed to me as I dig through the treasure trove of Indonesian hardcore, Oi! and crust I got from Melvin a couple of months back (and there's still another box on the way!!). And as much as I want to sing the praises of each release equally, there are a few that truly stand out - HUSTLER for example, and this absolute crusher from Bandung's DOMESTIC PRISON. No nuance, just a blistering and uncompromising dual vocal crust assault of the highest caliber. Twenty minutes of fucking annihilation with tracks like "Prepare" and "Get Fight To Fuck" leading the way. Place this one somewhere between DETESTATION and DROPDEAD on the comparison spectrum and them throw your preconceptions out the fucking window and reach for the volume. DOMESTIC PRISON are simply incredible. 

DOMESTIC PRISON

BUZZOV•EN

 

Story time - it'll be a little disjointed perhaps but the shit is all super (?) important... 

    I heard about BUZZOV•EN when ANCIENT CHINESE PENIS were in North Carolina in 1993. I was eager for anything new at that point in my punk life - I grabbed Hate Box and Wound based on someone's recommendation, and my mind was blown. The next year when MULTIPLE CHOICE were on tour, we listened to a promo cassette copy of Sore until the reels fell the fuck off. The singles I snagged on that ACP trip were good, but Sore was (still is) something else entirely, and when we saw them in Providence on that '94 jaunt? Fuck. Top ten sets ever - period. My first real experience being scared of and/or by punk...shit was actually dangerous and you were experiencing a band on the very brink of collapse just by being in the same room. That set had (has) staying power.

Fast Forward Four Years.....

    MULTIPLE CHOICE morphed into FUCKFACE and then crashed into a brick wall in 1998 leaving shards that birthed ARTIMUS PYLE. The three of us recorded with Billy Anderson in April. There were a lot of drugs. There was a whirlwind couple of weeks that included WORD SALAD covering "Angel Of Death" with Dino on vocals and DAMAD was in town too and we woke up a dude from HIGH ON FIRE at three something in the morning because we felt like we needed to hear what our recording sounded like on a stereo that wasn't John's Honda's tape deck and we played our first show. I'm not sure what exactly happened in what order, but a lot happened (and there were a lot of drugs). Shortly after Billy finished our single, he rolled into Toast Studios in SF with BUZZOV•EN...who showed up with no riffs. No songs. They just showed up with several days booked at an expensive recording studio on some label's dime. Billy called me a few days in, said that Dixie was recording conversations with crackheads on Mission Street while Kirk was scouring porn VHS tapes for potential samples (because it was the '90s and you couldn't have a sludge/crust record without samples) - he asked if I had anything they could use. I brought a few things down to the studio, including an educational record filled with first person testimonials aimed at keeping kids away from the horrible world of drugs. I offered that whole record, but noted one bit that FUCKFACE had used on their then-recent LP (guess which bit BUZZOV•EN used....? Cant think...can't think can't think can't think). After they finished the recording, BUZZOV•EN played a matinee show at Gilman. I walked in with Kirk and Billy and stared slack jawed as Kirk snarled at the teenage volunteer working the door "I'm gonna burn this place to the fucking ground" while getting his hand stamped. Their set that day was....something. There was fire. 

Fast Forward Some More Years....

    I was in a record store in Echo Park shooting the shit and drinking some beers when BUZZOV•EN came up in conversation. Turns out I was shooting the shit with the person whose label's dime funded that 1998 recording session - a session that had (at that time) still not produced a physical release. Small world, right? 

••••

    This is my copy of the 1998 San Francisco session that Billy gave me before the mix and master was complete - the tracks that eventually became Revelation: Sick Again that finally saw a proper release on Hydra Head in 2011 or so. There were a few forgettable recordings that came out after Sore (most notably that awful Gospel According...II on Allied) and there are some more recent releases that I admittedly haven't spent time with, but this....? This is BUZZOV•EN. If you listen with a discerning ear you can probably tell that some of the songwriting is phoned in, but you can also tell that these dudes were absolutely in the pocket on that tour - I think it was the first with Dixie on bass and he seemed to kick Kirk in the ass in a really good way. There's aren't many bands like this in the world - not now and not ever. Welcome to violence.

SONGS 1, 2, 3 FROM CASSETTE.

SONGS 4, 5, 6 FROM D.A.T.

ON THE BLOCK

 

Remember that shit I said about Oi! the other day? Well...Welcome to Asheville, punks. Three songs from ON THE BLOCK, who's moniker had better some kind of pisstake about the streets. Most notable to left coasters is Jerome (APEFACE, SNUGGLE) on guitar, but these tracks don't need no stinking pedigree at all. "Blocked" is a dark street punk anthem for the ages and the other two are straight slammers. Sass's vocals land somewhere between gruff UK82 and Carl McCoy and the tracks are addictive as fuck and I am so totally here for it. 

RIDE OR DIE

SVENSKA SPELMANSLAG

 

Look....this shit doesn't sound that great. Some punk probably nicked the tracks from youtube and dubbed them in a garage in the Central Valley on a tape deck they stole from St. Vinnie's. But here's the thing: It's not supposed to sound great. If you aren't sold on the irrelevance of fidelity by the time AVSKUM's "Livande Begravd" starts then I don't really know what I can possibly do for you. For the other TE readers in their right mind who aren't familar with the comp, I offer you this: MODERAT LIKVIDATION, SNOBB SLAKT, BRISTLES and PUKE mingling with lesser knowns like FRENETIK AGONI, SVEA SKANDAL, ORIGINAL SIN, KURI I KUVÖS and two absolute killer from SUBWAY ARMY. I missed a few I'm sure, but when you're dealing with primal SvenskPunk of this caliber...well, you get a little flustered. Essential blasting.

SVENSKA SPELMANSLAG 1

MANIACS

 

I've been blessed with a healthy handful of under the radar street punk slammers lately, and this collection of hitters from THE MANIACS stands proud at the top of the heap. Not my subgenre of choice, but I can listen to "Bovver Brigade" and "Cause Of Violence" all fukkn day and then some. The full package is well worth digging into - 2014's CDr release Survive on cassette with the Strength Of Oi! tape from 2016 housed in a beefy box with a booklet filled with more than enough images and word to make you feel like you (were) there. You want a hitter from Singapore that lands squarely between COCK SPARRER and CRIMINAL DAMAGE? You found it with THE MANIACS.  

OI! AGAINST RACIAL PREJUDICE

D. SABLU

 

Well documented and rightfully fawned over garage damaged stomps from New Orleans, D. SABLU has (not so) quietly earned a reputation for destructive hooks. It's one of the dudes from CASUAL BURN, but truth told I only know of the latter because I'm low key obsessed with the former - the No True Silence full length platter from earlier this year only intensified that obsession. A decade (plus) later, this shit fills the Reatard void I didn't even know I felt...and apparently I felt it deeply, because I want more and more. These songs dropped in 2022 (for a tour, obviously) - there are more, and you can start here or here. Just start please, and don't stop.

"LIVE" FOR TOUR

DUMSPELL

 

If you dig back through the archives, you'll find several posts where I talk about the magic of the Everything Is Not OK gigs that Ross curated last decade. It was truly something else to see other people (and punks but not just punks) feeling seen and celebrated, and I dare say that I haven't had any (or at least not many) punk related euphorias that have matched those weekends in the years since. The Mississippi punks were a huge part of those vibes, rolling up en masse and supporting each other. Lifting each other up and making sure that the rest of us saw their friends and their scene for what is was - creative, vibrant, determined....important. So today, seven plus years after a long drive back to California, I'm jamming this two song DUMSPELL tape and thinking to myself "yeah...that shit really was magic." And I'm grateful to (have) be(en) a witness. 

COWBOY SLUMBER PARTY

ENERGIA 80

 

Fidelity be damned on on ENERGIA 80's debut. The hardcore attack is real, the hooks are undeniable, but the sonic damage is truly something to behold with your ear holes. Hard to really tell what noise making device/s they are using while the flanged bass is holding the whole thing together like a lonely goth kid holding onto an umbrella in a windstorm at the beach. Vocals sound like the ghost of a child wandering around in a cemetery in a never released redux of Hocus Pocus and the guitars......? Well, there are sounds that might be coming from guitars anyway, and they are swirling around like smoke from a cauldron. Smoke from space or smoke from the depths? That's for the listener to decide, but only ENERGIA 80 truly know what kind of trip they are on - and Szégyen Kazzetták keep on delivering the goods.  

ENERGIA 80

AFFRONT

 

Tough as nails, raw as fuck hardcore from Chicago. AFFRONT don't need a justification and you don't need to know their pedigree. You just need to listen. Listen to "Speak" and listen to "Merchants Of Death" and know that this is what hardcore sounds like when you take away all of the bullshit. When you take away all the nonsense. This is what you're left with. Eight minutes of pure. That's it....AFFRONT is pure. 

A DEMONSTRATION OF AN AFFRONT

THE CLOWN

 

Oh my fukkn stars this is the punk that I needed today!! Full on street punk anthems clash with early DCHC influences to create a whirlwind of hardcore sounds that'll make you feel like you are sixteen again....or make you wish that you knew what the fuck was up when you were sixteen. This one dropped in the late '90s when Indonesian DIY punk was exploding with adolescent exuberance, and that energy absolutely translates. Drop "Riot (July 27th)" into "Sick Life" on a 45 and pretend it's a lost Killed By Hardcore heater and watch the nerds sweat...this shit is perfect. 

STATUS QUO

GREY NURSE

 

Pretty sure they were from New York and, considering the 2013 recording date on this self titled slammer, that kinda helps explain why they seem to have flown mostly under the radar. To us left coasters, the early '10s were awash with nuke york and toxic states and an avalanche of bands whose sound and aura kicked DIY punk in the fukkn teeth. A lot of that shit had (has) some real staying and some of those bands and labels truly left a mark....now that the dust has settled, the new has worn off and those kids who upset the system are now institutions, you can see some of those marks, even if they are faint. But what of GREY NURSE? Was NYC fucking with their interesting, passionate DIY hardcore in their world filled with fashion, cocaine and misanthropy? Maybe they were, but on this left coast I had no idea....until now. You can hear where they are coming from, but the great ones can put something familiar in front of you and still leave you floored, which is what their sole release does to me. Take the second track "Born Into This" as a prime example - in just 80 seconds GREY NURSE encapsulate all of the sonic protein that I need in my musical diet, and every second tastes delicious. The foundation is early '00s hardcore, leaning as much on the emotional tinges as the blasts and breakdowns - take the quiet middle section of "Excuses" or the gentle landing in "Born Into This" as evidence that, quite simply, these cats knew exactly what they were doing. The vocals on "Asleep." The nod to Kirsch with the guitars that open "Stolen Language." The sheer intensity of the closer "Old." Each subsequent listen reveals more moments...and that's an indicator that the recording you're listening to is, in fact, truly great. So maybe GREY NURSE weren't with the in-crowd at the time, or maybe they just were just a blip and didn't have time to jump in the water...I'm not here to analyze sub-scenes or do a post mortem on trends that dominated past decades, today I'm just here to suggest that you listen to this GREY NURSE tape, because it's really good and it sounds like they really fucking meant it. 

GREY NURSE

CIRRHUS

 

CIRRHUS were an ugly band. Raw, forceful black metal with no pretense or nuance and vocals that sound like a desperate animal just before expiration. And then....listen to the guitars. Listen to the sounds. CIRRHUS were truly a beautiful band. 

PROMO 2012