THE VALLEY RECALLS

 

I snagged this at Savers in San Jose last week; honestly I mostly grabbed it because there were a shitheap of cassettes but nothing at called to me, not even faintly. There had to be something. So I combed through the mail order cassettevangelists and Grandma's schmaltz again determined to find a reason to spend 74¢ even it was spent on crap. Suffice to say that it wasn't crap. Maybe I just needed to look again, so the universe could help me find a reason to stop looking. When you first put it on, The Valley Recalls kinda disappears; but then you stop - and so many other things appear in the sounds.  So comb again if you need to.....that's the lesson.

RAGA BHOOPALI

NTSP PAL

 

Full on freak synth. 

I literally don't know what else I could ask for tonight, since there's no way this world can be real. 
There are bonus tracks.

FULL OF SPOTS

DOGMATICS

 Some shit from Boston's DOGMATICS played on the radio sometime around 1984 (or so). You know those bands you don't know you need until you know you never had them? DOGMATICS fit that bill - probably flipped by the reissues dozens of times....but that won't happen again. A bunch live(?) acoustic songs here that may or may not be related, but they were on the same tape and you know how I tend to operate. So enjoy.

DOGMATICS

IN REACH

 

Where the fukk was this in 1998 and why wasn't I there with it?! Index finger stabbing the air on every chorus, fastcore meets posi-crew....absolute OUTLAST energy (with a touch more 'core) from the first Vermont band I've ever posted on The Escape. Pretty sure that leaves Alaska as the only state still unrepresented on these pages, so naturally I welcome Alaskan cassette submissions. This tape though, you're going to have to dig deep to find a band who did it better. If Dan reads this, Dan's gonna love this. 

DEMO '98

LAMICTAL

 

Total CONEHEADS and/or CCTV style hyper-energetic freak punk but kinda faster and more sinister feeling. Saw 'em last week with INNUENDO (same gig I bought that Robert Lester Folsom tape at) and they kinda floored me, guitarist also had style and moves that will make you ask yourself why you don't have moves. The shit is stellar, y'all. Trust me. 

HARD PILL TO SWALLOW

ROBERT LESTER FOLSOM

 

I had this sweet mid-90s Maximum Rocknroll Radio tape I was gonna post but my track listing didn't match the audio and I'm having a really gnarly week so I didn't feel like sorting out the edits and shit so....so I'm not posting it but it started with a BLINK 182 song that's pretty good (in context) and it just feels weird to type out those words but I listened again and it's true so I am determined to post that MRR show soon. In other news......

I went to see INNUENDO and NECRON 9 last week and they both ripped. Milwaukee punk rules period. The locals were fine, but the opener was a SoCal outfit called LAMICTAL and they also ripped. Singer runs a label called Popular Affliction and I stocked up on my way out of the gig (live shows are still the best place to buy records and tapes, straight up). Truth be told, I didn't pay too much attention and just traded $40 for a bunch of tapes I didn't know shit about because the band was good and the dude seemed chill and stoked. got a few hardcore and synth punk tapes.....but then I checked this motherfukkr out. I don't know the history and I don't really care because FUCK ME this shit is beyond beautiful and there's a dude in Southern California releasing hardcore slammers and melancholy '70s freak folk and where has this reality been all my life, you know? Check this shit:

"See You Later, I'm Gone"

"Heaven On The Beach With You"

"Nobody Wants Me"

"I'm Still In Love With You"

"Sunshine Only Sometimes"

"Slowly Sinking Ship"

"Lonely Lovers"

"She"

....yeah punk, this shit is real as fuuuuukk. I don't know what else to say and/or what other context to offer. I went to a punk show and dropped $5 on a previously unknown and currently essential collection of sounds from a different world.....the sounds are not punk, and I made the right choice. Will you make the right choice?

ODE TO A RAINY DAY
SUNSHINE ONLY SOMETIMES
ARCHIVES 1972-1975

BLACK T-SHIRT

 

You're going to want to ignore the cover here, because this tape looks like it's gonna sound stupid as fukk. It doesn't sound stupid though, far from it. BLACK T-SHIRT is a super killer hi-nrg street punk slammer, and if you can't get down with tracks like "Janji Janji Tai Anjing" then I'm not even sure what you're doing here. Because there are a lot of things here and they are all important things....but damn, a good punk song is such a beautiful thing and there are a lot of really good punk songs on this tape. 

KUMPULAN TEMBANG KELUH KESAH PELIPUR LARA

BOTTLED UP

 

Someone wanna tell me how I missed this? It's entirely possible that I am simply not cool, but this ultra cool and utterly devastating thing apparently happened under my nose in the late 2010s. That think was called BOTTLED UP. Shit sounds like PARLAMENTARISK SODOMI and NO DICE playing a bar in Menlo Park in 1998 and I am so fukkn here for it. Just wondering why I wasn't there for it, you know?

FARALLON

NEONATES

 

Categorization rendered impossible, and I am grateful to Los Angeles' NEONATES for the challenge. My reference points include SISTER FUCKER, girlSperm, THE SLITS, some shit like BLURT that was on Rough Trade 40 years ago...but these are just reference points, you know? NEONATES doesn't sound like any of the above, but their plodding meanders and the shrill yelps take me to the same place. Or to a similar place. I like it there. It's not my place and it's not a place for me....but I'm happy to be able to visit from a distance because it seems really cool there. They were done a decade ago, so whatever (or wherever) that place is, it's in the past like a lot of other cool stuff. 

NEONATES

TONAL SHIFT

 

Remember twenty five years ago when TOTAL FURY kicked North America in the ass by reinterpreting '80 DCHC and making it sound impossibly familiar and completely original at the same time? The hardcore they were drawing from was twenty years old when they were doing their shit (or by the time that shit made it to us), and they were doing it without the benefit of immediate digital access to all punk. Vienna's TONAL SHIFT are doing the same thing, but they're pulling the meat off of a forty-five year old bone and fuuuukkkk does it sound juicy. I haven't heard a band use this formula this well since 13 Songs, and they use the distance and perspective to their extreme advantage. "Act The Big" is quintessential early Dischord leaning into Rev Summer sounds, "Mentally Checked Out" has the adolescent strain that made (makes) the pure pre-internet hardcore feel....different. Even if this is a band who stepped into the world and looked at all of their options and decided, "we're going to do that" instead of making something 'new,' what they've done is take the 'that' in question and make it new. They've made it theirs. And now it's ours. 

THE E.P.

RIBBON

 

Look - the tape sounds like shit, but you know I'm  gonna give it the way that I get it and I'm not sorry about that. But really you should get the sounds from RIBBON direct because the replication here is as bad....but the tracks are fukkn bad ass. Then again, listing to this shit as presented kinda makes me feel like I'm having auditory hallucinations and it's a completely different listening experience. But the tracks....the sounds...RIBBON. Let's talk about this shit? Yes, let's. High end hyper energetic punk with drums way up front and an enviable early '80s manifestation that feels and sound unmistakably now. And that's the shit, y'all. If there were justice in the world, then "Unchained" would be my summer anthem because it's a perfect damn hardcore punk song. But because my brain is weird (and there is not justice in the world) I'll probably spent the hot months with this stuck in my head like it has been for the past three weeks (which is fine, shit slaps). RIBBON goes so damn hard, punks, and they're doing it right....do this. 

RIBBON - DEMO

TERVEET KADET

 

If you described to me all of the things that make quintessentially Finnish hardcore so distinctly Finnish, you'd probably be describing many of the qualities I seek and enjoy in a hardcore band. So it doesn't make sense that when I first started hearing the Finnish classics....I wasn't moved. It seems unaccessible in a way that's difficult to articulate, but it was also a long ass time ago (and honestly I think that fans of Finnish hardcore might even be pleased to hear that someone heard 'their' music for the first time/s and thought "nah...this isn't for me"). The spell was broken in 2003 when Markku suggested that I guy a copy of The Horse and that record didn't just make TERVEET KADET click, it made the whole damn thing make sense. Anyway, I got this bootleg that says it has tracks from 1983 + 1984 demos plus a 1983 gig in Syke and the tape fukkn rips start to fin(n)ish. So song titles, but your listening device must have a volume control toggle or knob or button so use that instead and think of the years I lost by not "getting it."

DEOMOS (83, 84)

GUNS FOR AFGHAN REBELS

 

I know what you're thinking - you're thinking "It's Friday so there's probably (hopefully) going to be a mix tape" and "There's been so much crucial Indonesian shit on The Escape lately, I would love a collection of bands I've never heard of from the world's fourth most populous country." Good news, punk: I have got you covered. THE STUPID are harsh, relentless and out of tune. MEINKAMPF (in addition to having a really unfortunate name) are also out of tune and have the weirdest duel vocal trade offs. DISPARATY are uncompromising ramshackle hardcore street punk (and also pretty much out of tune).  THE PLAGIATOR play catchy gruff punk anthems - kinda like WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN with super harsh vocals but from the world's fourth most populous country and definitely drunker (and also they are also pretty much out of tune most of the time). It sounds like the bands just lined up outside the studio and walked in one after another and banged their tunes out on the same equipment while the engineer slugged homemade swill and didn't move a single fader. Look, I would be lying if I told you that any single song on this tape was going to improve your life, but we listen to punk to hear punk - not to improve our lives. Sometimes we get both, but we're here for the punk.  So it's Friday, and I've got some intriguing Indonesian tapes burning a hole in my shelf...so you're welcome. 

GUNS FOR AFGHAN' REBELS: DOUBLE SPLIT EP

MASTER BEDROOM

 

I don't want to fill these pages with reflections on un-lived past lives, but....a 1992 Wizard hearing these two tracks in Oklahoma would have lost his shit. The 2025 Wizard hearing these tracks in California is also losing his shit, but it's different somehow. I'm not exactly sure how.......not exactly, but it's different.  Whatever you are and/or wherever you are now, you need these sounds. This is SUICIDE for the new real(ity), this is Reality for the new Now. "Toxic Megacolon" to the future freaks....

CASSINGLE No.1  

GARY GILMORE MEMORIAL SOCIETY

 

I wasn't ready for GGMS. I didn't know what I was getting when I pulled off the slip cover, but I surely wasn't expecting....this. GARY GILMORE MEMORIAL SOCIETY would have ruled my world in 1990, a world dominated by experimentations in experimentation in general in a time when punk, new wave, industrial, proto-indie sounds all held equal space in my head (and heart) because the people who could help show me what was "cool" weren't in my life yet (and thankfully, still aren't). The slow, breathy, almost absent-minded sounds would have held me like a baby in those days, provided me comfort and offered me an escape. "I Don't Wanna Go Out" would have been my reason to not go out before I even knew I would have bouts of crippling self induced anxiety decades later. "Do You Ever Think Of Me?" would have been my reminder that....no, they don't....while the gorgeous no-fidelity acoustic swell of "Kind And Loving Things" would have offered support in spite of everything. These are quiet, distant anthems for the never-was and hope for the never-will-be. A subtle trio from the past, honest and intentional sounds damaged by time and degradation. Absolutely gorgeous...there aren't many releases that hit this hard, so please don't skip this one.

LEAVE ME ALONE 1987-88

I won't be the last one 'cause there's nothing left to be

R.'N'R.

 

I started with the I've Had It / Your Rules 45 and it was interesting mostly because no one was doing that then. Then came the Manic Ride/Dead Alive full length (I know there were other 7" bangers in between - I'm just talking about what passed through my earholes) and it was like.....I dunno, if I want THIN LIZZY I'll go listen to THIN LIZZY and even though that's not really what R'N'R was doing it still felt like the energy they were trying to conjure and let's be honest here: AT released II the same year The Infamous And Notorious came out and are we really going to have a discussion about preferred punk interpretations of rock 'n roll? The were Boston Hardcore royalty by 2004, but still....ANNIHILATION TIME. Anyway, this first demo passed my desk a few weeks ago and it was (is) a really fun listen - surprisingly rudimentary considering the future output from this crew of Scene Giants. Four rock 'n roll / hardcore hybrid tracks from folks responsible (in part) for THINK I CARE, INNUMERABLE FORMS, VACCINE, BOSTON STRANGLER, RIVAL MOB, BATTLE RUINS, MIND ERASER and about a dozen other bands...but really? You had my heart when you ripped the Metal Health cover, because that was The Wizard's first hard rock record. 

DEMOLITION

DISKORPORASI

Raw DBeat crust massacre. Six fierce tracks recorded in 2001. Five more recorded in 2013 with determination, analog distortion in place of precision. The new(er) stuff is an exercise in blown out ramshackle DBeat, but that early session is an absolute steamroller not to be missed. 

WORLD STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION

ROYAL JELLY

 

I was talking to a co-worker a couple of weeks ago about the time he was asked to join John Cougar's band right before Cougar recorded American Fool. We've traded stories in the past, so I was kinda surprised that I hadn't heard that tidbit before but I guess it's good to hold a few morsels in reserve - shit, I just heard about the Janie Lane solo tour a few months ago. Anyway, conversation ensued and someone (me) looked the dude up on the internet and checked his curriculum vitae and saw a new (to me) band listed so I asked, "What's up with ROYAL JELLY?" His face lit up and he smiled, "Of all my musical projects and bands, and all the touring...ROYAL JELLY is still my favorite." They were a short lived would-be supergroup in the mid-1990s, but they were super to the wrong group of folks and the suits never figured out how to market them. You've got a band who could've (should've) been playing with BECK, JANE'S ADDICTION, BLIND MELON and the like, even infringing on grunge territory here and there. ROYAL JELLY could have dominated alternative radio (and "Ceiling" made a legitimate, if brief, radio splash)....but you still have to sell the shit. The kids who were listening to alt-rock radio in 1994 did not give half a fuck about a new project featuring ex-members of MONTROSE, KROKUS, FOREIGNER and KINDOM COME, and the butt-rock set probably wasn't grooving on the modern sounds of ROYAL JELLY. And this is why, thirty years later, I'm asking the drummer for crew calls and we're working to see which teams will be on projects that will carry over to the following work day. Life is a weird one. 

CEILING // SKY

IVY

 

Mid-decade Big City freak style on full display with Public Access, capturing two IVY offerings from 2013 & 2014. The "Hooks? Yes. Fidelity? No." model is an extremely effective one, so much so that I found myself revisiting the EPs to see if I liked them as much as I enjoyed feeling this distortion pierce my skull. Fun fact? I didn't. Now I do. It's all about "What You Know," you know? Then feel the guitar on "Antsy" for the win.

PUBLIC ACCESS

MINOR THREAT // BAD BRAINS: MIX TAPE

 A couple of weeks ago I posted some crucial live BLUE CHEER over on Escape Is Terminal. The tracks were taken from a couple of different sets recorded in 1968 and took up one side of a commercial blank tape, leaving the other side for a killer collection of tracks featuring BLUE CHEER offshoot MINT TATTOO and some Spanish garage slammers. Keeping with the same theme today, there are two wild sets over on the other blog from MINOR THREAT and BAD BRAINS - neither recording (or band) should need any introduction, but both were pulled off of a Philadelphia radio broadcast from 40 some-odd years ago....and someone had some space left on the flip side of their commercial mix tape. What follows is a casually curated mix that opens with two ubiquitous (and undeniable) classics and rolls into US hardcore and UK punk standards. For those among you who thought the perfect weekend afternoon mix tape didn't exist. 

MINOR THREAT // BAD BRAINS: MIX TAPE 

W.N.A.

 

Visitors who snagged the Tribal War cassette back in November are likely salivating seeing another release from East Java's WORLD NASTY ANARCHY pop up on these pages, and to those wise folks I simply say: You're welcome. As always, there's something truly special about bands who punch above their weight, and that described Born To Be Free perfectly. W.N.A. deliver with frustrated fury instead of competent confidence, and listen to "Struggle For Life" and you won't want to hear them any other way - blistering, raw, hardcore/crust/grind with no frills offered and no fukks given....wipe that drool off your chin.

BORN TO BE FREE

NEGATIVE PRESS

 

"Prison Girls" is actually the start of the second side, but this one came to me wound first side second and who am I to contradict fate? In this case, fate was a great decider.....the deliberate dirge of the two tracks on that flip are formidable and set the table brilliantly for the blown out JESUS LIZARD cum grunge punk that dominates the would-be first side. See what I did there? If you're confused, don't be. Also don't be dissuaded by the completely annihilated in the red replication, because NEGATIVE PRESS was meant to be listened to destroyed, you know?

NEGATIVE PRESS

WET

 

Maybe Uncle Nick can shed some light on this distorto-grunge punk juggernaut, but until that happens I'm just gonna sit over here and squirm around and feel uncomfortable and chair mosh the afternoon away. The bass is so fukkd like the early PNW shits from 35 years ago, the vocals are perfect irreverent '80s SoCal beach punk and the riffs are....well, the riffs are really good y'all. Really good. "Focused" is the choice cut for those who need to focus on one piece instead of the whole. See what I did there?

WET

BONE SICKNESS

 

I remember hearing about BONE SICKNESS around the time of this demo. White hi-top thrashers dropping bombs in weirdo Olympia and sharing bills with freaks and art punk mutants. Listen to this absolute monstrosity and you'll see why those PNW punks were murmuring - I know there was more after this (and the 20 Buck Spin record is a must-have) but nothing touches the raw, primal energy of the first demo. Period. Raw sonic filth. 

BONE SICKNESS

SABOTAGE

 

First wave DIY Jakarta hardcore fully realized on 2006's Give Us A Freedom, adding melody and melodic leads into their high energy street punk without ditching the obvious '80 UK influences. Just check the cover and the logo - should tell you pretty much all you need to know about where they were coming from, and then throw in a few RANCID records for good measure. The title track should be your summer anthem....if you make it to summer. 

GIVE US A FREEDOM

VAGRANT

 

I suppose I could ask Nick because he's the one who sent me the tape, but: "what the actual fuckk is this and why am I hearing it for the first time tonight?!?!" In the world of raw, nihilistic, honest hardcore, bands like VAGRANT are a rare breed and this tapes like this should hold a special place in the conversation. The shit is just fukkn nasty, loose, wild....the shit sounds real and the shit feels dangerous. And if you're a punk, then these are things that you want when you're listening to punk. So tell me: Punk or Bootlicker? Just curious. Responses in the comments, please and thank you. 

VAGRANT

MAX NORDILE HAIR CLINIC

 

Unbridled improvisational glory. I have talked about the compulsion more times than I care to own, and yet here I am again consumed by the compulsion. I have a lot of things I want to do, a lot of things I think might be cool, a few things that other people might even enjoy (though mostly I'm concerned with the things that I think will be cool). And it's that last parenthetical that is really the point here - Max is doing this for Max. Everything I think about....? Max does. I have ten releases and/or projects in my mind and Max has put twenty into the Realms and is already thinking about the next.....thing. And the compulsion is what really compels me to keep listening. I am drawn to the sounds as much for the sounds themselves as I am drawn to the sounds for the concept of the sounds. I hope you can understand that because it's....well, it's kindof a big deal. Now, speaking of the sounds: Melting Garden Bed State Hatchery is unbridled improvisational glory. There are damaged synths, found sounds, discordant horns, manipulated percussives, alien electronics...it's 34 minutes of mystery presented as sound. It's listening to worlds you don't belong in. Worlds you don't deserve. Worlds you are grateful for. 

MELTING GARDEN BED STATE HATCHERY

SURAM

 

Four slabs of lo-fi bluesy stoner doom with some of the most desperate vocals you will hear this week. While the first sentence does a pretty good job of summing up Tanpa Kepastian, I feel it's worth noting how much the raw production and delivery adds to SURAM's appeal. Some bands rely on production, some bands don't need the production and still benefit from it. SURAM exist outside of it and the shit is filthy. "Alam Liar" is the choice cut - creating a space for themselves somewhere between BLUE CHEER and DOPETHRONE. You can try to figure out how they pull that off if you like, I'll just be here jamming. 

TANPA KEPASTIAN

INYECCION

 

I remember having a hard time putting INYECCION in a box that made sense when this bomber dropped a few years ago. By the time Porqueria came out I think the collective punk world had more or less figured out what do 'do' with them, but this demo was a complete head scratcher. You know the sounds - raucous Japanese pogo, Latin American anarcho/DIY hardcore and fierce UK punk are all here in spades - and INYECCION make it feel like you haven't heard them all together like this. Full force dupa-dupa with ferocious shrill vocals trading off with a sharp bark...and that guitar. GAI caliber sonic damage giving these riffs the fukkn business. I figure folks probably lumped them in with THE WANKYS and the like (right?) and they weren't wrong if they did. For me.....? I'm gonna lump them into their own fukkn world. 

INYECCION

JUST A PRODUCT

 I've shared a couple of JUST A PRODUCT demos before, and these songs also appear on the Free As A Tree demo so maybe one could argue that I don't need to share them here today. But some piece of shit yuppie didn't have to call SFMTA and have my van towed for blocking their driveway today....but they did it anyway. Here's the thing though; while you can not honestly argue that I actually blocked their driveway, you can certainly argue that these tracks are worth listening to (again). If ever there was a band that bridged '80s UK punk and '90s college/alt/grunge, then Bulgaria's JUST A PRODUCT is exactly that band. 

8 TRACKS