HOLEHOG // B-SIDE

 

B-SIDE is an indescribably off-kilter side project from one of the A GLOBAL THREAT dudes. Aggressive introvert hardcore with elements of '90s basement DIY and (bizarrely) industrial-tinged alt. I'm not hear to make sense, just listen to "It's Complicated" because it is. On the flip side from B-SIDE, which some refer to as the A-Side, you'll find Sacramento's toughest recent street punk export HOLEHOG, born from the ashes of MONSTER SQUAD before those very ashes resurrected themselves. Snotty, clenched fist pogo punk of the highest fucking order. "Wasting Away" all day every day. 
You want to know a secret.....? I fukkn love punk.

TO HAVE AND TO HOLD

CINDERBLOCK

 

Remember ten years ago when CINDERBLOCK fukkn exploded in front of our eyes with one demo, one LP and one EP and then just vanished? It was exactly what we needed - hard edged high energy street punk ripped from the grooves of the Punk Lives - Let's Slam comps. It was DEFIANCE for the generation who never got to see Consensus Reality-era DEFIANCE, it was punx 'n skins, it was CRIMINAL DAMAGE and everything we hoped the CASUALTIES would be....and oh my stars was it good. Fortunately for you, young punk rocker, this shit hits just as hard as it did in the last decade. If "Disco Killers" doesn't get stuck in your head then you're either square or you're dead, and "Voiceless" still makes me lose my voice. 

CINDERBLOCK

===================================

HEDGEFUND

 

A dozen years after HEDGEFUND initially appeared on these pages comes their post script. I posted their self-titled debut in 2012 and Apreiron was snail mailed to me with the companion OHR // P.A.Y. shortly thereafter. I sat on both of them for the average lifespan of a trash panda before I unleashed the former on you a few years ago but still I waited for this one.....just because. "OHR" is a brutal sonic exercise, painful noise and deliberately manipulated sound while "P.A.Y." is an even rawer version of the band who hurt us with their two previous releases - howling, desperate. You're going to recognize the sounds here....but you'll never hear them the same again after you listen to them like this. This band was relatively short lived and I fear the waves they made were rather small, but damn this shit was good. 

OHR // P.A.Y.

JON KABAT-ZINN

 

Very few Escape visitors will be able to (or will choose to) fall in line with the mission here but still I will encourage you:
Relax. Focus. Listen. Feel. Explore. Think. FEEL. Focus. 
It is very likely that this is the simplest cassette I have ever posted....it's also possible that it's the deepest. Because this time it's not about the sounds or the contents....it's about you.

BELLS AT 5, 10, 15, 20 & 30 min
BELLS AT RANDOM TIMES

MELEE

 

The thing that made MELEE cool is that they were so decidedly not cool. They seemed to sit at the perpetual kids' table while the USDIY scene subdivided itself and anointed royalty in the early '00s. Meanwhile, they delivered consistently ferocious raw hardcore every bit as fast as the th/en vouge Y2K thrashcore explosion, harnessed the political (and sonic) rage of CRUDOS and made the shit sound like they owned it.  Were they game changers.....? Perhaps not. But this demo, along with the EPs and splits that followed over their brief existence, have aged extremely well. Unpretentious, honest hardcore. 

MELEE

NORTHEASTERN HYMNS

 

You want something profound? Nah man, this is just four songs from four modern black metal bands I had never heard of before I listened to Northeastern Hymns. That's all. The OBSIDIAN FOREST and INFERNA BRUO tracks are exceptional. I don't like the other two quite as much, but that's just me, you know?

NORTHEASTERN HYMNS

PROLETARIAT

 

Gratitude to the old punks who captured and distributed this shit. PROLETARIAT are perhaps (somewhat) under-appreciated, but this boot shows that real-time punks knew what was up (I see you, Felix). A live WERS set and tracks from Soma Holiday and the elusive Distortion demo....you need this. A full 60 minutes, and you need all of it. "Events / Repeat" on repeat, and then "Options" forever. 

RADIO SHOW BOSTON

TRAP THEM

 

Sometimes you need something different. Something heavy and commercial. Something ugly. I was blasting and enjoying the first side of Filth Rations and thinking about how completely outside of my realm these sounds actually are (even though the sounds themselves are completely within my realm), and then I flipped the tape and the second side wouldn't play at all and I tried and still nothing so I thought....yeah, tine for some more shitty poorly produced punk. So thanks to TRAP THEM for the respite. I was nice to nestle in the lap of brutality for seven minutes. 

FILTH RATIONS

THE FREEZE

 

My hand slipped when I was scanning the cover - that's gonna happen when you're cranking seminal Boston hardcore at 2am and I don't feel the need to apologize. Still blown away at the progression from "I Hate Tourists" in 1980 to this infectious hardcore masterpiece just two years later, but really I just don't understand why this record isn't up on the altar alongside the USHC essentials. This is the 1990s Taang! reissue that was available in bargain bins throughout the 2000s - pretty sure this copy was $5 at the store on Melrose on a WHN? SoCal trip, and it's still available for $6 direct from the label. That's how the classics should be, and Land Of The Lost is an absolute classic. Probably the most California sounding Boston act (check "Sickly Sweet" in particular), this record (tape) is nothing but track after track after track and I can't think of a better way to spend a Thursday. So yeah...if you're still thinking about that blurry cover scan....? I'm don't really know that I can help you and you might not find what you need here. For the rest of you though.....THE FREEZE.

LAND OF THE LOST

BRAIN KILLER

 

Damn, this band is severely under appreciated. Maybe there were just too many bands doing *this* at the time, but really I think it swas because there were a heap of other  bands who were doing this a few years earlier and punk attention spans are criminally short. But hindsight is a motherfukkr, and the BRAIN KILLER material doesn''t just hold up - the shit shines. Raw, powerful, noisy, manic hardcore punk from Boston - live shit, some covers, punk, no song titles, no compromise, off the rails. And also punk. 

BRAIN KILLER

SAY GOODBYE

 

Meaty. turn of the century Boston hardcore - reared on the classics with a forward focus that's even more keen in retrospect. The foundation here ;ands somewhere between early '80s Boston and late '80s NYHC, but in 2002 the USDIY world was filled with barely retro-posi and Y2K fastcore energy...all of that shit is here. Then consider that the nuclear of SAY GOODBYE would later be connected to MIND ERASER, WASTE MANAGEMENT, THINK I CARE, RIVAL MOB and a host of others? Well, you see where I'm going here. SAY GOODBYE's 2002 demo was the launch point for a lot of this shit, for a lot of these dudes, and the vision is absolutely clear on these four tracks. "Don't Lean" to start your day, punk.

SAY GOODBYE

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

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

PANDEMIX

 

Even though they named themselves four years too early, these Boston punx kicked the fukkn doors in with Pathological Culture. From the monologues in "Total Immersion" and "Conceptual Fuck" to the off the rails unrealized UK anarcho on pharmaceutical speed vibes in "Second Opinion" just wind them up and hear them roar. They've grown into a new and compelling animal since 2016 and the new(ish) Love Is Obliteration is a total killer that showcases this early vision fully realized...but in typical elitist fashion I'm still gonna point you to the demo first because you gotta start where shit starts, you dig? Four modern hardcore burners that manage to not sound like anything you've heard....or at least not like anything you're comfortable with (which is arguably more important).

PATHOLOGICAL CULTURE

MFP

 

Sometimes you just want the good shit with no frills...sometimes you just need MFP. Three meaty hardcore stomps from a Boston crew with a pedigree longer than your list of grievances. From the up-tempo "Death Delights" to the flawless DEAD BOYS cover that you didn't know you needed to hear until you hear it and you don't want to hear anything else. So you go back to the beginning.

MFP

FUCKHEADS

 

Holy fuck is it a face blast to crank this tape after it sat on a shelf for a decade!!! FUCKHEADS took the over the top noisepunk guitar manipulation that NERVESKADE dropped on the DIY world in the late '00s and injected it into a blistering embodiment of intense rapid fire East Coast hardcore. The foundation is hardcore punk - period - and that's what makes their treatments so perfect. Absolute face melting supremacy with erratic ADHD guitar treatments that make FUCKHEADS simultaneously difficult and fascinating to listen to, and check "Traitor" to learn about appropriate BPM implementation in hardcore punk. I feel like future punk is creeping in from the past to tap me on the shoulder and remind me that it's not quite time to die...yet. July 25th 2024 and listening to FUCKHEADS makes me feel alive. 

2011 SUMMER TOUR TAPE

LIMBS BIN

 

Noise is violence, manifested as five minutes of power(ful) electronics. 

A GLASS OF SOUR QUINCE

SAVAGEHEADS

 

Y'all remember this shit, right? Hardcore punks have flirted with street punk and Oi! since forever, and there have surely been some notable wave and notable successes, but ......this fukkn SAVAGEHEADS demo cleaned house when it dropped. Game changer. "Prisoner Of The CIA" sounds like fukkn BAD BRAINS and LA FRACTION at the same time - how does that even happen?

SAVAGEHEADS

SUNSHINE WARD

 

I dunno - maybe I should still post this shit on the Live Blog (because it's live) but....this shit needs to be blasted. Twenty plus minutes of sweaty, studded, raw Boston hardcore released for their summer tour in 2016. Readers looking for pretty things should just come back later, because SUNSHINE WARD are anything but. 

THERE WILL BE QUIET....AFTER THE GIG

 

FOREIGN OBJECTS

 

If it seems like I've been on a bit of a 2010s deep dive lately....perhaps that's because you are perceptive. Maybe I just missed a lot from that era, maybe I just blind grabbed from a shelf that happened to have a lot of nuggets all hanging out together, but I'm not complaining and I don't think the minions will be either after they revisit (or are introduced to) FOREIGN OBJECTS. Sharp, urgent Boston punk with fierce femme vocals right up front drawing from '90s Olympia as much as early punk. There's a killer three band split with DAYLIGHT ROBBERY and DEFECT DEFECT and I kinda feel like that a perfect place to squeeze this band in, though the distinctive vocals are such a huge focal point that it's really hard to try to put them in a box with any other band/s. And this tape appeared in 2011 (a format variant of the Vinyl Rites 12" released the same year) because that's apparently the year I'm supposed to be paying attention to at the moment. Focus Track: "Words Of War."

NO SENSATION