GREEN BERET

This one shouldn't be lost on any self respecting follower of current DIY hardcore....but maybe you missed a chance to snag their 2014 West Coast tour cassette? Here you go. Full throttle throaty DBeat hardcore from Boston, recorded live in the studio and sounding hot like fire. I don't think there's so much as a breakdown until "Concrete Nightmare" at about the halfway point of this sub-15 minute collection of creamers. They ripped that basement to shreds when we played with them in Oakland, and capturing that live fury on for a tour release was a class move. Even if you have the records, this one is worth your time. 

HARDCORE 2014: LIVE AT SIDE TWO

PÁLL PARKER

Welcome to a 22+ minute mindfuck courtesy of Iceland's Páll Parker. Buried beats, gross manipulations, and an overall presentation that will have you wondering if there's something a bit off with your download interface wiring harness capacitor because things just aren't supposed to sound this weird, you dig? It starts to really (really) get fukkd around the 15 minutes mark - the beats build in presence and intensity and trigger staccato washes of white noise, panic inducing sounds I can only compare to dreams of drowning...dreams that start to feel like reality as To Smear The Sexual Organs begins a cool down/breather before the finale that dissolves into just that erratic beat pulsating as though your life is skipping. And who is say that it isn't......?

TO SMEAR THE SEXUAL ORGANS

JOCK CLUB

I still sometimes think about that MARSHSTEPPER show at The Lab in SF a bunch of years ago, when I showed up on time (stupid) and waited for HOURS before anything happened and then when something did happen it was a fucking laptop techno DJ kid and I was silently fuming because I'm old and sometimes I get cranky and sleepy and I just wanted to fucking see MARSHSTEPPER and then after a few minutes I was like "damn, this laptop DJ kid is fukkn banging" and then I was really happy and MARSHSTEPPER was super good too. Yeah....been a JOCK CLUB fan ever since that night. Good job, laptop DJ kid. 

IN THE JUNGLE

GIDIM

I've been spending most of my recent music listening time with artists that are "heavy," but decidedly outside of the punk/metal sphere/s. BROTHER AHH, PATRICK COWLEY, the recent BILL CONVERSE platter, ALICE COLTRANE reissue/s, and I cannot recommend the Numero JOANNA BROUK collection highly enough - some of the most beautiful and emotive sounds I have ever heard. But....sometimes things pull you back. And today when I got home I didn't want introspection or nuance, but I wanted depth and I wanted power. And I wanted rage.....so I listened to the three tracks on the 2013 GIDIM demo very fukkn loudly. And then.....? And then I listened to them again. Searing and discordant one man black metal....sometimes it's what a person needs. 

GIDIM

SKIN GRAFT

An early portal into the world of cripplingly prolific noise artist SKIN GRAFT, these two tracks take you on a 30 minute journey through ambient field recordings, subdued but harsh industrial and manipulated electronics. Rather than a slap to the face, 2007's Drug Addict drags you through the slog and pulls you under layers of sound until it feels like your drowning so that even 12 minutes into the first track, when the sound starts to release its hold, I find myself bound even tighter. This is lights-off-music, and among the first of many dozens of SKIN GRAFT releases over the last decade...like a premonition of dark Future Times. 

DRUG ADDICT

PISSE

Two killer demos one one killer tape. The third freakout weirdo release from Germany's PISSE, Kohlrübenwinter is such a gloriously chilled out approach to a particularly appealing brand of outsider punk, and it is predictably a favorite at TEHQ. The general vibe is ultra '80s new wave, but the approach is still punk, and it still has teeth. The stomper "Schwätzer" takes the caketape for this listener, but there are zero legitimate bummers contained on this cassette...you know you like this shit, so dig in. 

KOHLRÜBENWINTER

FALLAS

Have you ever said to yourself "Man, I want eleven bursts of blown out, late '90s Mexican punk!" I have...and if I don't reach for the ODIO tape (let's be honest, the ODIO is really for those grindier moments) then I'm probably gonna pull out this FALLAS banger. Eleven bursts of distorted mania from Guadalajara with jerky rhythms and multi vocal shouts...and an intensity that is very raw and extremely pure. You know what I want? I want the guitars that start "Anárquico es el Pensamiento" to be my sonic spirit guide....because fukk are they heavy. So yeah....get dirty. 

MUSICA PARA LA RESISTENCIA