TOTAL KEPEP

 

The only complaint here (if you could dare to be bold enough to complain) is that Medan's TOTAL KEPEP are not as noisy as the title of their sole release might suggest. But these sounds are rough and direct form the same streets where I met a pre-teen with "FUCK COPS" tattooed on his neck just a few years after Make Noise Not Music dropped. Enough said, I hope.

MAKE NOISE NOT MUSIC

COOL MUTANTS

 

I've been laid up sick for the better part of a week and still feel like a pile of moldy socks stuffed in a skin suit - headed to the Billion Dollar "Healthcare" Corporation this afternoon to get a chest x-ray to see if I have pneumonia, feeling pretty damn privileged that I can just get that shit looked into instead of stressing about the money or access or whatever. Who knows what the world of health care in this lost country looks like in a few years, but we're already the worst of all of the so-called "first world" nations (and most of the second and third) and I don't really feel any institutional motivation to move the collective US (get it?) in a positive direction, so I'm gonna really savor this x-ray, just in case. Normally when I'm feeling under the weather, I plow through cassettes - ripping and uploading and scanning and pontificating and whatnot, assuming someone will eventually read my missives, but sleeping bathed in sweat for 16hrs a day doesn't really lend itself to many extracurriculars...I did manage to handle this COOL MUTANTS slab for 2012 and honestly it's putting a smile on my face this afternoon. Think REATARDS, M.O.T.O., SONICS SPITS and you aren't going to be surprised, but there's a lot to be said for some hi energy comfort food for your earholes when you feel like shit. 

COOL MUTANTS

SWANS

 

I have a complicated relationship with SWANS. I get it - I truly get it. Pushing envelopes and provoking thought in realms of sound and humanity is itself an art form, and few artists were doing either with as much verve as SWANS in the 1980s. The sounds....? There was Glenn Branca and of course SONIC YOUTH so the casual deep diver would be intrigued but not shocked. Challenging traditional concepts of music is one thing, but sitting down with "Time Is Money (Bastard)" when I was in high school was something entirely different. Hearing Gira mumble "You should be violated. You should be raped. Don't fight back: I need you." as a fourteen year old will stick with you, you know? I truly wonder if you can push boundaries artistically without pushing them in in reality, and later encounters with people in and around Gira's circle would give credence to what was once simply a wonder. Does it negate the art....? I don't think so. But it makes my relationship with the art more complicated. The whole point was to make the consumer uncomfortable, so....success?

TIME IS MONEY (BASTARD) • A SCREW

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL

 

I fully recognize that virtually every descriptor one could possibly apply to most of the artists featured on the six hundred seventy-eighth episode of Maximum Rocknroll Radio would dissuade most Escape visitors from listening. But believe me when I tell you that while I was shuffling around the apartment today, sick as hell and full of phlegm and trying to celebrate the second birthday of Murder The Cat (who really just wanted to sleep under the bed like she does literally every other day of her life)....this radio show hit me just fukkn right. TILT, HORACE PINKER, BLANKS 77, CHINA DRUM, MEGA CITY 4, SMUGGLERS and more, as broadcast in the Bay Area and participating radio stations worldwide almost 29 years ago...before we got our music from the internet.

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL #678

CRUX OF VIPERS

 

Punk deserved more from CRUX OF VIPERS. Punk deserved CRUX OF VIPERS to exist as more than a project. But we're used to not getting what we deserve and appreciating what we have. This tape is so fucking good. 

CRY TUFF GLORY

SPAD

 

What if MARKED MEN had been a hardcore band from Yogyakarta? Check "Expand Your Field" and then let us discuss. Consider the impact TOTAL FURY had when the Western World heard 13 Songs a lifetime ago, play this SPAD ripper from 2023 and then let us discuss. We are going to have some serious discussing to do.

SPAD

DISREJECT

 

I remember in the '00s when the word 'extreme' took over. It was applied to everything from sodas to pizza to bicycles...it was so overused and meaningless that SCHOLASTIC DETH wrote a song about it (I feel like it was really the pizza that pushed them over the edge. Well, if I may be bold enough to step into the mistakes of the past.....DISREJECT are extreme grind/crust. An ultra brutal and extremely raw multi-vocal assault on all senses that will take your breath away for a solid quarter hour. And then you can have your life back. 

DISREJECT

SCARECROW

 

North Carolina's SCARECROW are one of my favorite current US hardcore bands. When I see them live, I'm gonna lose my fukkn shit. Three searing tracks backed with three essential covers - their version of "Kill The Police" is so far beyond essential. Are there hordes of current US hardcore bands I have yet to hear? Certainly. When I listen to SCARECROW, I simply do not care about the bands I haven't heard yet. 

SJÄTTE MASSUTDÖENDET NÅR NORDEN!

MALARIE

 

Yesterday morning on my bike ride in to work I listened to the most recent episode of MaximumRocknroll Radio, which is available wherever podcasts and streaming things are available (this blog is a dinosaur, offering only links and .zip file mp3 downloads and words). I listened to Zu and Michael fawn over and play tracks from their favorite releases from 2024 and.....and I was struck. I was struck by how much so. many. songs. they. played. reminded me of something I had listened to in a time that existed (possibly?) before Zu and/or Michael had been borned. I didn't hear the songs of think these thoughts in any kind of way...it just felt real and honest and I was into virtually every song I heard on the show - NINE:FORTY:PM and BRANDY SENKI were particularly striking and naturally S.H.I.T. and CHAT PILE were instantly striking. But the point is that I felt like I had heard it before but I also (and more importantly) felt like the sounds were new and real and important....and now enter MALARIE. It's not really the same because it's different (I know, I have a way with words and you're welcome), but their sound just lands in a place that I know....the first time I heard these songs they were familiar, and listening to their more recent offerings is really just a confirmation. MALARIE are dreamy goth tinged (so-called) post punk that hit like FOR AGAINST setting their sights on a support slot for some unnamed '80s alt/gaze/goth group....you know this sound. And Friends Of The Escape will know that they love this sound. You have these sounds in your mind and your heart....now get them into your earholes. 

HYSTERIA

NO MAN'S LAND

 

You've probably noticed the swarm of Indonesian punk tapes occupying these posts over the last few months and if you're anything like me you start sweating when you see (even more) DIY punk shits that you suddenly need in your life. NO MAN'S LAND started in 1994 when Indonesian punk was in its infancy, and sometimes things just hit different when you can feel how real they are. Ultra basic tupa-tupa political street punk will make you feel alive, young (at heart) punk. And if you need a hearty dose of earnest ramshackle Oi! with serious @PATIA NO energy...start sweating. 

GROW AWAY FROM THE SOCIETY

ELECTRON PANIC

 

When most people come across a tape like this, they just keep walking. I don't. When I come across a tape like this, I wonder.....because you just never know. It probably won't change my life, it might not even enrich my life, but curiosity is a powerful beast, you know? So I dust it off, squint to read the faded labels and then pop it in the deck hoping it plays - and if it does play then I listen to something that logically no one should have ever heard again. And sometimes? Sometimes it's instantly apparent that I have made the right decision. The first side is titled Electron Flagration, a collection of ambient and electronic experimental sounds that instantly validate my curiosity. Primitive electro-prog periodically invaded by soundtrack scores and the previous inhabitants of the cassette....an indescribably brilliant listen. Panic In Detroit on the flip is a Detroit-themed proto-punk mix masterfully curated and packed with hits, I almost presented it as one untitled track so you could listen the way I did (probably should have, actually). It probably didn't change my life, but do I feel enriched? Yes....yes I do. 

ELECTRON FLAGRATION // PANIC IN DETROIT

VIVID SEKT

 

Maybe it's odd to wax nostalgic about a 'current' era, but then I realize that 2009 was two or three punk generations ago - shit, Jan's Room was not even a decade old when I learned about hardcore so I'm really talking about the before times when I blab about bands that were playing fifteen years ago. And fifteen years ago it felt like a damn rebirth. There were the Silenzio Statico ponx in LA, SF and Oakland felt like the same scene (even though SF really only had Thrillhouse to compete with the energy of East Bay warehouse gigs) and you could get wild at HOTDR in San Jose or roll up to Sac....and there was Portland. Not like that place wasn't already on the map, but the punks were doing something different there MORAL HEX, ARCTIC FLOWERS, BOG PEOPLE...and VIVID SEKT. I posted this demo when The Escape was only a couple of months old and when I came across a double copy a few weeks back I felt like I was catching up with an old friend. This particular brand of forceful, straight forward punk tempered with UK anarcho sounded like nothing else at the time, and when you listen to day it's almost as if VIVID SEKT are (still) standing determinedly mid stream just letting decades of sonic trends flow past them. They're awkward in the most juvenile way, a presentation that requires concentration results in tracks like "Horde" that are absolutely timeless. 

VIVID SEKT

PECAH KEPALA

 

PECAH KEPALA are a low, muffled rumble coming at you like an mudslide of sound. Churning, squirming, suffocating Jakarta hardcore - would have been worth the 12hr flight just to see them tear up the floor for fifteen minutes. Can you imagine Jonestown Aloha! mixed with Everything Falls Apart? PECAH KEPALA can.....hell, PECAH KEPALA did. 

DEMO 2013

MYSTIQUE

 

Maybe 2020 did 'em in like it did a lot of other bands, but I never heard shit from MYSTIQUE after this 2019 burner. I mean, maybe it's just as well since this shit is flawless and you'd hate to see (hear) them follow it up with a stinker, as unlikely as that sounds after blasting "Pressure Of Steel Hands" and realizing that you are in fact strong enough to conquer the day before you. That's what MYSTIQUE does - they sound like they're physically pushing and pulling you at the same time, just to make sure you get the fukkn message one way or another. Forceful femme vocals and that UK82-by-way-of-power-crust swinging stomp that permeates sooooo much modern USDIY punk (this is not a complaint - merely an observation); there are only four songs here and maybe these four songs are all we're ever gonna get but....if you're gonna go fast, then at least go hard, right?

DEMO 2019

CHRONIC DISEASE

 

I don't mind being able to (correctly) just a book by its cover sometimes, and this tape from CHRONIC DISEASE delivers precisely what you expect when you look at it. Seventeen blasts of off the rails sample laden hardcore featuring tracks like "Full Of Nothing" and "Raise The Old Pain." Shit is rough, forceful and honest. A little sloppy sometimes (a lot sloppy other times) and that's exactly what you want. Even when it's not what you want...you might just find it's what you need. 

 HARD-RAW RAMGAGE: DIS-COGRAPHY 2004-2011

THE RESIDENTS

 

I had a RESIDENTS record when I was in high school - bought it because the eyeballs looked cool and never truly understood what I owned even though I rarely listened to it (probably because I didn't understand it). Now I wonder how that record (and a few others I copped when I was a pimply small town adolescent) made it into a shop in Ponca City, Oklahoma but....that's a discussion best filed alongside all of the other unsolvable mysteries in my life like "Why can't the richest nation-state in history feed and house its citizens?" and "Was my father actually murdered?" As the title suggests, this recording from 1986 celebrates the thirteenth year of THE RESIDENTS, which means they were well established outsiders long before they creeped onto my paltry record shelf a few years later....and it also means that THE RESIDENTS were next level freaks, making music that wasn't supposed to make sense to a kid like me in that place and time. I wasn't supposed to understand it - I was supposed to be confused and.....curious. Thankfully, I still am. Both.

13th ANNIVERSARY SHOW

ZIPPER

 

Deranged USHC of the most primal variety. "Labels" into "Sheep" might be the best example - VOID level unhinged. This ZIPPER shit just sounds ugly and a little ugly is exactly what I need to make it through the day. 

TOUR TAPE XXIII

SHOUTING OUT LOUD

 

A whole lot has changed in my life, but a whole lot is the same. I am....the same. A middle aged guy with a stupid job who fukkn loves listening to punk. Sometimes I'm compelled to talk and/or type about it (punk), but sometimes I just sit and listen to it (punk). Maybe I crack open a cold one while the punk plays or maybe I chill with the cat while the punk music plays, but when the punk music plays...something feels right. Even if I don't feel right, something in me does. Punk rules, okay? And so I listened to Shouting Out Loud tonight while the cat just looked at me disapprovingly - four bands from another world and a cat from this one. FULLMOON was kinda whatever melodic punk. DEATHCONTROL kinda reminded me of BLOWN TO BITS (which will only mean shit all to readers who were in the Bay Area during a very specific time in the '00s). SNACK OI! were.....I mean, they're called SNACK OI! for fukk's sake and they do a killer OXYMORON cover. But it was really about RAUCOUS; their three bursts are urgent punk at its finest and I'm making a mental note to find out more about this band tomorrow (which will be today before you read). Punk rules, okay?

SHOUTING OUT LOUD #1

CELESTIAL SEWER

 

Whether it's improvisation or calculated damage, the Max Nordile Family Of Music take my breath away with each unsolicited and appreciated package. I was about to describe CELESTIAL SEWER as the "latest" offering but then caught myself because there are probably another half dozen pieces of sonic irreverence waiting in the wings and Down In The Sink is merely the latest offering to reach my grubby (and greedy) little mitts. Teaming up this time with M. Magic (GIRLsERM, LOS PUNK ROCKERS, MOZART, STILLSUIT) and M. Furlong (NASTI), M. Nordile lurches through six pieces of improvisation and/or calculated damage with bass bleating like a lost trombone and Magic's guitar making excruciating sounds that simply defy identification....much less compartmentalization. The constant compulsion to create is a quality that I both share and envy, and barging forward even (especially) when you don't know where you're going helps to blend journey and destination into a froth that seems to go perfectly atop any morning beverage. So drink up (again), my friends.

 DOWN IN THE SINK

POLTERGEIST

 

It's been a minute since I've had something stick to me this quickly and stick with me this completely. Came home yesterday after a pretty decent day and popped Stupid Songs in the deck before I took off my coat - and it's not even that it's that over the top, it's that it feels that right when I listen to it. Just real good, real catchy, real earnest melodic punk. Sometimes you don't need anything fancy, you know?

STUPID SONGS

MERKED

 

You know those days when you only have, sayyyyyyy seven minutes or so but you feel like getting brutalized by at least eleven churning gut punches? An urge to grind but short on time? Thankfully, in moments like these there is MERKED. Sometimes I only have a scant minute to spare and I blast "Last Breath" so I'll have a nice twenty-two seconds leftover, but on luxurious days (like today) when I am in a bit of a rush but I'm able to set aside a full seven minutes for grind time....I listen to Good Night start to finish.

GOOD NIGHT

DOTTLÄND

 

Sometimes the most obvious answer is the right one. Sometimes it's better to keep things simple, because sometimes things work for a reason. So don't think you're going to hear something you've never heard when you blast DOTTLÄND. But what you are going to get is a furious dose of churning Scandi-Beat from the All Day Hell school. And it's fukkn perfect.

MARTYR'S DEATH

POKOKE

 

Kinda sounds like some kids in Bandung were cranking some '77 UK punk boots back around the turn of the century. They probably listened to that shit daily until one of them said....'wait, this shit is easy - we can make these sounds ourselves' and then maybe POKOKE was born. Major chords, raw and tinny, bluesy riffs, snotty as fuck all with songs like "Fake Life," "Poor Boys" and "Let's Have Punk." And now you get to live those moments with the sounds surrounded by a very new reality...

REVOLUTION

LUNCH BUNCH

 

I remember when FUCKFACE and HICKEY rolled up to our show in Edmond, Oklahoma in 1996 and immediately noted the kid with the hand painted GRIMPLE logo on his crisp leather jacket. It just seemed out of place - awesome, but out of place. Later, my buddy Ross would tell me that the OKC/Edmond scene in the '90s was pretty fixated on Bay Area punk and hardcore (and that's before we start talking about Tulsa's relationship with HICKEY), and has since pelted me with more than a few unsung examples of that fascination. Enter: LUNCH BUNCH. High energy, kinda snotty pop punk trio that would have done just fukkn fine playing an afternoon show in El Sobrante back in 1992...perhaps this is just the kind of nostalgia you need as the world crumbles.

LUNCH BUNCH

V.V.M.

 

How was your Thursday? Mine was chill. Well, mostly chill. Went to work (that was less chill) then took the ferry to Angel Island with my mom. Well, we missed that ferry and while we were trying to figure out what to do some lady shouted "anyone else boarding for Tiburon?" and we were like "fuck it" so we went to Tiburon. Walked seven miles or so, went up a few big ass hills, saw some good ass views, passed some stinking rich motherfucking houses and then got on the ferry back to SF. Except the ferry stopped at Angel Island on the way back so I guess we went there after all. Came home, ate some spaghetti, talked for a few hours, cried a bit. You know, regular Thursday shit - how was your Thursday? Mine was chill. Gonna give Friday a shot now, one day at a time style. I suggest listening to V.V.M. today - that's what I'm gonna do.

CRUCIAL BURGER

US//THEM

 

Not sure when and/or how this one slipped by, but it's here now and I'm gonna hold onto it for a while. Massive, discordant, uncompromising modern hardcore from Los Angeles. US//THEM make me think about the later '00s in a very good and enthusiastically nostalgic way. What does they make you think about?

DEMONSTRATION 2021